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A  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF 

THE  EVOLUTION  OF 

TRINITARIANISM 

AND  ITS  OUTCOME  IN  THE  NEW 
CHKISTOLOGY 

BT 

LEVI  LEONARD  PAINE 

WALDO  FBOFESSOB  OF  ECCLSSUJ3TICAL  HISTOBT  IN 
BANGOB  THEOLOGICAL  8BMINABY 


"Lore  .  .  .  rejoiceth  with  the  truth." 
Paul. 

*'  In  the  degree  that  we  become  true  Christians, 
We  shall  discover  more  brethren." 

AuausTE  Sabatieb. 


BOSTON  AND   NEW  YORK 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 

OT&e  iMttt^tte  ptt0^,  Cambridge 

1900 


f3 


COPYRIGHT,  1900,  BY  LEVI  LEONARD  PAINS 
ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


GENERAL 


TO  MY  PUPILS 

OF  THIBTY  CLASSBS,  WHOSE  EAGER  SPIBIT  OF  IKQUIBY 
Ain>  CORDIAL  SYMPATHY  AND  FRIENDSHIP  HAVE  BEEN 
MY  CHIEF  INSPIRATION  IN  ALL  MY  HISTORICAL  STDDIES 
AND  TEACHING, 

AND  TO  MY  WIFE 

WHOSE  CARE  AND  COOPERATION  HAVE  BEEN  SO  ESSEN- 
TIAL TO  THE  COMPLETION  OP  MY  TASK,  THIS  BOOK  IS 
AFFECTIONATELY  DEDICATED. 


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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

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http://www.archive.org/details/criticalhistoryoOOpainrich 


PREFACE 

This  book  is  the  outcome  of  an  invitation  ex- 
tended to  me  in  1893  by  the  editors  of  "The 
New  World  "  to  write  an  article  on  Athanasianism. 
It  was  also  suggested  that  I  should  touch  on  its 
historical  relation  to  present  New  England  trin- 
itarian  and  christological  thought.  The  special 
original  study  which  the  preparation  of  this  article 
involved,  and  the  new  light  thus  gained,  led  to  the 
preparation  of  a  second  article  on  the  Pseudo-Atha- 
nasian  Augustinianism.  This  was  followed  by  a 
third  article  on  New  England  Trinitarianism,  in 
which  it  was  shown  that  the  earlier  Greek  Athana^ 
sian  form  of  Trinitarianism  had  given  place,  in  the 
Latin  church,  to  the  Pseudo-Athanasian  Augus- 
tinianism, and  that  New  England  Trinitarianism 
in  all  its  various  developments  was  Augustinian 
rather  than  Athanasian.  Thus  the  question  raised 
by  the  editors  of  "The  New  World"  was  fully 
answered.  I  have  to  thank  the  editors  for  per- 
mission to  publish  these  articles  in  this  volume,  of 
which  they  form  the  first  three  chapters.  These 
chapters  have  suffered  no  essential  change,  except 
that  the  account  in  the  first  chapter  of  the  initial 


vi  PREFACE 

stages  of  the  evolution  of  the  trinitarian  dogma  in 
the  New  Testament  period  has  been  considerably- 
extended.  The  remaining  chapters  of  the  book, 
forming  by  far  the  larger  part  of  it,  follow  out,  as 
far  as  possible,  the  lines  of  trinitarian  evolution 
already  traced,  and  indicate  what  must  be  their 
logical  and  historical  outcome  and  conclusion.  So 
that  the  volume  as  a  whole  will  be  found  to  have 
a  completely  organic  unity. 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say  that  my  object 
has  been  throughout  to  give  the  results  of  an  un- 
biased historical  and  critical  study  of  the  subject. 
My  aim  has  been  first  to  ascertain  the  exact  histor- 
ical truth  concerning  this  most  important  chapter 
of  Christian  theological  thought,  and  next  to  state 
all  the  facts  thus  gained  with  the  utmost  can- 
dor, sincerity,  and  freedom.  I  know  how  difficult 
it  is,  even  for  a  professed  historical  scholar,  to 
divest  himself  of  all  theological  prepossessions; 
but  I  can  truly  say  that  I  am  not  aware  of  having 
been  governed  in  my  historical  researches  by  any 
other  motive  than  the  simple  and  earnest  desire 
to  reach  historical  truth,  and  also,  so  far  as  it  lies 
within  the  limits  of  a  historian's  task,  such  reli- 
gious conceptions  and  grounds  of  theological  be- 
lief as  history  may  properly  suggest  and  sustain. 
But  such  conclusions  contain  no  a  priori  dogmatic 
element ;  they  are  wholly  drawn  inductively  from 
history  itself. 


PREFACE  vu 

Of  course  no  historian  is  called  to  divest  himself 
of  his  Christian  faith,  or  of  the  expression  of  it  at 
times  in  his  historical  studies  and  writings.  But, 
as  this  book  itself  will  show,  religious  faith  is  a 
very  different  thing  from  theological  dogma,  and 
I  can  frankly  declare  that,  while  my  studies  in  the 
history  of  Christian  doctrine  have  led  me  more 
and  more  strongly  away  from  a  priori  dogmatic 
positions,  my  religious  faith  has  been  able  to  rest 
itself  more  and  more  securely  on  the  great  fun- 
damental verities  of  religion.  There  has  been  a 
disposition  on  the  part  of  dogmatic  theologians  to 
excite  a  prejudice  against  historical  studies,  as  if 
they  tended  to  a  spirit  of  skepticism.  Such  per- 
sons have  a  very  false  conception  of  the  effect  of 
such  studies.  It  is  true  that  they  tend  to  destroy 
a  blind  faith  in  unhistorical  traditions  and  in  theo- 
logical dogmas  that  are  found  to  lack  the  histori- 
cal basis  which  has  been  claimed  for  them,  but 
such  destructive  results  are  far  from  being  evil. 
On  the  contrary,  they  free  the  mind  from  skeptical 
tendencies  by  making  clear  the  historical  paths  that 
lead  towards  religious  truth.  It  has  been  custom- 
ary to  distinguish  history  from  faith  and  dogma, 
in  religious  matters,  as  if  history  were  not  reli- 
gious, and  had  no  religious  function.  The  Christ 
of  history,  for  example,  has  been  compared  with  the 
Christ  of  faith  and  of  dogma,  as  if  the  true  Christ 
of  the  Christian  religion  was  something  wholly  dif- 


▼iii  PREFACE 

ferent  from  the  Christ  of  history,  and  was  of  a 
higher  supernatural  order.  But  such  a  view  wholly 
mistakes  what  history  is,  and  what  its  place  is  in 
the  divine  order  of  the  world.  Surely  the  longer 
one  studies  history,  and  the  more  deeply  one  enters 
into  an  understanding  of  its  hidden  laws  and  forces 
and  movements,  the  more  clearly  does  one  appre- 
hend its  truly  divine  function  as  a  revealer  of  God's 
providential  plans  and  purposes  concerning  this 
world,  and  also  as  a  continuous  panorama  of  hu- 
man events,  unveiling,  as  the  years  go  by,  the  pro- 
gressive revelations  of  his  truth  and  love  and  grace. 
This  book  will  fail  of  its  great  object  if  it  does 
not  succeed  in  bringing  out  this  fact  that  history 
is  God's  great  providential  teacher  of  men.  The 
Christ  of  history  is  indeed,  it  must  be  understood, 
the  very  Christ  of  God.  In  this  view,  Christ  is  not 
reduced  below  his  true  measure,  but  history  is  raised 
to  its  rightful  place  in  the  divine  administration. 
Such  a  conception  of  history  tends  directly  toward 
a  truer  conception  of  God  in  his  relation  to  this 
world  and  to  man,  —  the  noblest  creature  that 
dwells  on  it.  It  brings  all  things  into  the  closest 
connection  with  God's  fatherly  providential  gov- 
ernance, love,  and  care.  Especially  does  it  raise 
man  himself  into  true  fellowship  with  God,  and 
into  that  "  full  assurance  of  hope  "  which  rests  on 
the  continually  increasing  evidence  which  history 
affords  that  God  is  good,  and  that  "all   things 


PREFACE  ix 

work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  Him." 
It  is  under  the  inspiration  of  such  a  conviction, 
which  my  historical  studies  have  only  strengthened 
and  illumined,  that  this  book  has  been  written, 
and  my  hope  and  prayer  is  Jhat  it  may  lead  others 
into  it,  and,  further,  into  the  moral  strength  and 
courage  and  trust  that  it  so  richly  yields. 

LEVI  L.  PAINE. 
Bangob,  Me.,  January,  1900. 


CONTENTS 

CHAF. 

I.  Athanasianism 1 

II.  The  Pseudo-Athanasian  Auqustinianism      .  58 

III.  New  England  Tbinitakianism     ....  97 

rV.  The  Tbinitarian  Outlook        ....  139 

V.  The  Trinitabl^n  Result 162 

VI.  The  New  Histobical  Evolution     .        .        .  175 

VII.  The  Demand  of  the  Histobical  Spibit    .        .  186 

Vm.  The  Demand  of  the  Religious  Spibit  .        .  195 

IX.  The  Demand  of  the  Intellectual  Spirit        .  221 

X.  The  New  Theological  Method       .        .        .  247 

XL  The  Materia  ta  of  the  New  Theology    .        .  263 

XII.  The  Constbuction  of  the  New  Theology  .  271 

XIII.  The  New  Chbistology 279 

XIV.  The  New  Chbistian  Atonement     .        .        .  288 
XV.  The  Leading  Featubes  and  Benefits  of  the 

New  Theology 308 

XVL  Conclusion 314 

APPENDIX 

A.  The  Johannine  Pboblem 319 

B.  A  Criticism  of  Pbofessob  A.  V.  G.  Allen's  "  Con- 

tinuity OF  Chbistian  Thought"        .        .  368 

C.  Pbofessob  Pfleiderer's  Article   in  the   "New 

World" 377 

Index 383 


"  Whatever  appears  to  me  tx)  be  true,  or  most  probable,  after 
candid  and  earnest  inquiry,  with  all  reverence  for  the  sacredness 
of  the  subject,  I  utter,  without  looking  at  consequences.  Who- 
ever has  a  good  work  to  do  must,  as  Luther  says,  let  the  devil's 
tongue  run  as  it  pleases.  There  are  two  opposite  parties  whom  I 
cannot  hope  to  please,  viz.,  those  who  will  forcibly  make  all 
things  new,  and  fancy,  in  their  folly,  that  they  can  shake  the  rock 
which  ages  could  not  undermine ;  and  those  who  would  retain 
and  forcibly  reintroduce,  even  at  the  expense  of  all  genuine  love 
of  truth,  everything  that  is  old  ;  nay,  even  the  worn-out  and  the 
obsolete.  I  shall  not  please  those  hypercritics  who  subject  the 
sacred  writings  to  an  arbitrary  subtilty,  at  once  superrational 
and  sophistical ;  nor  those,  on  the  other  hand,  who  believe  that 
here  all  criticism  —  or  at  least  all  criticism  on  internal  grounds 
—  cometh  of  evil.  Both  these  tendencies  are  alike  at  variance 
with  a  healthful  sense  for  truth  and  conscientious  devotion  to  it ; 
both  are  alike  inimical  to  genuine  culture.  There  is  need  of 
criticism  where  anything  is  communicated  to  us  in  the  form  of  a 
historical  tradition  in  written  records  ;  and  I  am  sure  that  an  im- 
partial criticism,  applied  to  the  Scriptures,  is  not  only  consistent 
with  that  childlike  faith  without  which  there  can  be  no  Chris- 
tianity or  Christian  theology,  but  is  necessary  to  a  just  acuteness 
and  profoundness  of  thought,  as  well  as  to  that  true  consecration 
of  mind  which  is  so  essential  to  theology."  —  Neandeb,  Preface 
to  Life  of  Jesus  Christ. 


EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 


CHAPTER  I 

ATHANASIANISM 


The  New  England  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is 
plainly  passing  through  a  critical  phase  in  its  his- 
tory. That  a  rapprochement  of  some  sort  is  quietly 
going  on  between  so-called  Trinitarians  and  so- 
caUed  Unitarians  is  clear  to  any  careful  observer. 
Trinitarians  are  ready  to  declare  themselves  Uni- 
tarians in  some  good  sense,  and  Unitarians  are 
equally  ready  to  declare  themselves  Trinitarians  in 
some  other  good  sense.  Mr.  Joseph  Cook  con- 
cludes an  impassioned  defense  of  what  he  calls  the 
old  trinitarian  faith  with  a  description  of  "  God's 
Unitarianism,"  which  of  course  is  his  own ;  while 
Dr.  Bartol,  when  asked  if  God  is  in  three  persons, 
answers :  "  Yes,  and  in  all  persons.''  It  is  a  sign 
of  the  times  that  the  Nicene  creed  is  enjoying  a 
sort  of  revival.  Trinitarians  are  rallying  to  it  as 
the  true  centre  of  their  position.  Prof.  A.  V.  G. 
Allen,  in  "  The  Continuity  of  Christian  Thought," 
declares   that  "  the   question   is   not  whether  we 


2  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

shall  return  or  ouglit  to  return  to  what  is  called 
Nicene  theology ;  the  fact  is  that  the  return  has 
already  begun."  Homoousios  is  once  more  the 
trinitarian  watchword.  The  latest  Congregational 
creed  begins  with  it.  Unitarians  are  equally 
in  favor  of  it.  "We  are  all  Athanasians,"  ex- 
claims Dr.  Bartol.  The  old  Channing  Arianism, 
it  seems,  is  out  of  date.  Dr.  Hedge  asserts  that 
the  Nicene  Council  by  its  homoousian  doctrine 
began  "  a  new  era  in  human  thought,"  and  claims 
that  it  contains  the  essential  truth.  Dr.  J.  H. 
Allen  thinks  the  triumph  of  Nicene  orthodoxy  was 
providential,  and  "  saved  Christianity  as  a  great 
social  and  reconstructive  force."  Where  are  we, 
and  what  next  ?  ^ 

Meanwhile  it  is  in  order  to  inquire  what  Atha- 
nasianism  really  is,  and  whether  Athanasius  himself 
would  recognize  many  of  his  modem  disciples. 
This  is  the  object  of  the  present  chapter.  It  pro- 
poses a  historico-critical  survey  of  the  Nicene 
Athanasian  Trinitarianism,  and  its  relation  to  ear- 
lier and  later  forms  of  trinitarian  dogma.  For  it 
must  be  distinctly  recognized  at  the  outset  that 
this  doctrine  is  no  exception  to  the  universal  law 
of  historical  evolution.  The  Nicene  theology  was 
the  product  of  three  centuries  of  controversy  and 
growth.  But  this  evolution,  in  its  further  history, 
suffered  one  great  break.     A  radically  new  epoch 

^  Joseph  Cook,  Boston  Monday  Lectures,  Orthodoxy,  p.  68. 
Prof.  A.  V.  G.  Allen,  Continuity  of  Christian  Thought,  p.  19. 
Dr.  F.  H.  Hedge,  Ways  of  the  Spirit,  p.  351.  Dr.  J.  H.  Allen, 
Fragments  of  Christian  History,  p.  119. 


ATHANASIANISM  3 

in  the  development  of  the  trinitarian  dogma  was 
begun  by  the  North  African  Augustine.  This 
celebrated  man  had  a  singular  influence  upon  the 
whole  course  of  Western  theology.  He  fixed  the 
Canon  of  Scripture  for  Latin  Christendom ;  he 
introduced  the  doctrine  of  purgatory,  and  strength- 
ened the  materialistic  ideas  which  ruled  mediaeval 
eschatology  ;  he  laid  the  foundations  of  that  rigid 
view  of  human  depravity  and  of  divine  grace  and 
predestination  which  issued  in  Calvinism.  But 
more  far  reaching  still  was  the  new  turn  he  gave 
to  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  by  which  the  way 
was  opened  for  the  Sabellianizing  tendencies  which 
have  infected  Western  theology  to  this  day.  To 
class  Augustine  with  Athanasius  and  the  Greek 
Fathers,  as  has  so  often  been  done,  is  to  entirely 
misunderstand  him,  as  well  as  the  general  relation 
of  the  Greek  and  Latin  churches  in  the  fifth  cen- 
tury. Li  Augustine's  day  the  Western  Empire 
was  breaking  in  pieces  and  yielding  to  barbarism. 
The  Greek  language  and  culture  were  dying  out. 
Augustine  himself  was  not  a  Greek  scholar.  There 
is  no  evidence  that  he  ever  read  Athanasius  or 
any  of  the  later  Greek  Fathers.  He  never  quotes 
them.  His  philosophical  ideas  were  drawn  from 
Western  Neo-Platonic  and  Stoic  sources  rather 
than  from  the  pure  Eastern  fountains  of  Plato  and 
Aristotle.  It  is  no  wonder,  then,  that  the  Greek 
Trinitarianism  assumed  a  new  shape  in  his  hands. 
He  did  not  understand  its  metaphysics  or  its  ter- 
minology.   Besides,  he  had  little  respect  in  general 


4  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

for  Greek  theology.  He  refers  to  Athanasius  in 
terms  of  admiration  as  a  hero  of  the  faith,  but  he 
treats  Origen,  the  greatest  and  most  influential 
thinker  of  the  ancient  Greek  church,  as  a  heretic. 
Thus  the  history  of  Trinitarianism  divides  itself 
into  two  distinct  chapters,  —  the  Greek  Athana- 
sian,  and  the  Latin  Augustinian.  This  chapter 
will  deal  with  the  former. 

Athanasianism  has  its  roots  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, and  behind  the  New  Testament  is  the  Old. 
Here,  then,  our  survey  must  begin.  The  Old 
Testament  is  strictly  monotheistic.  God  is  a 
single  personal  being.  The  idea  that  a  trinity  is 
to  be  found  there,  or  even  is  in  any  way  shadowed 
forth,  is  an  assumption  that  has  long  had  sway  in 
theology,  but  is  utterly  without  foundation.  The 
Jews,  as  a  people,  under  its  teachings  became  stern 
opponents  of  all  polytheistic  tendencies,  and  they 
have  remained  unflinching  monotheists  to  this  day. 
On  this  poiut  there  is  no  break  between  the  Old 
Testament  and  the  New.  The  monotheistic  tradi- 
tion is  continued.  Jesus  was  a  Jew,  trained  by 
Jewish  parents  in  the  Old  Testament  scriptures. 
His  teacning  was  Jewish  to  the  core ;  a  new  gos- 
pel indeed,  but  not  a  new  theology.  He  declared 
that  he  came  "  not  to  destroy  the  law  and  the  pro- 
phets, but  to  fulfill "  them,  and  he  accepted  as  his 
own  belief  the  great  text  of  Jewish  monotheism : 
"  Hear,  O  Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  is  one  God." 
His  proclamation  concerning  himself  was  in  the 
line  of   Old   Testament  prophecy.     He  was  the 


ATHANASIANISM  5 

"  Messiah  "  of  the  promised  kingdom,  the  "  Son  of 
Man  "  of  Jewish  hope.  In  all  Christ's  declarations 
concerning  himself,  as  given  in  those  Synoptic 
gospels,  which  contain  the  earliest  traditional  ac- 
counts of  his  teaching,  there  is  a  marked  reticence 
as  to  his  person.  If  he  sometimes  asked :  "  Who 
do  men  say  that  I,  the  Son  of  Man,  am  ?  "  he  gave 
no  answer  himself  beyond  the  implied  assertion  of 
his  Messiahship.  There  is  no  hint  anywhere  of  a 
pre-incamate  life,  or  of  a  supernatural  birth,  or  of 
a  divine  incarnation.  He  calls  God  his  Father, 
but  he  also  teaches  that  God  is  the  Father  of  all, 
and  gives  his  disciples  the  Pater  JVoster.  Cer- 
tainly Christ  had  a  clear  consciousness  of  his  own 
intimate  moral  relationship  with  God,  but  there 
is  no  evidence  that  the  idea  of  a  peculiar  meta- 
physical union  with  God  ever  entered  his  mind. 
At  least  it  did  not  appear  in  his  synoptic  teaching. 
The  period  of  nearly  a  generation  between  Christ 
and  Paul  is  one  in  which  we  are  dependent  on 
the  oral  traditions  that  circulated  among  the  ori- 
ginal disciples.  These  traditions  were  subsequently 
gathered  together  in  various  gospels,  of  which  the 
three  Synoptic  gospels  have  survived.  These  gos- 
pels in  their  present  shape  are  much  later  than 
Paul,  but  they  contain  traditions  that  plainly  go 
back  to  the  time  of  Christ  himself,  and  thus  ante- 
date the  period  in  which  Paul  wrote  his  epistles. 
There  are  also  in  these  gospels  additions  that  as 
clearly  belong  to  a  later  time,  and  it  has  been  the 
important  task  of  historical  criticism  to  distinguish 


6  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

the  original  traditions  from  the  later  additions. 
Of  the  writings  of  our  New  Testament  the  epistles 
of  Paul  are  the  earliest  in  date.  The  First  Epistle 
of  Peter,  if  genuine,  as  it  seems  to  be,  comes  next. 
The  authorship  of  all  the  remaining  portions  is 
wholly  uncertain,  and  the  dates  are  plainly  con- 
siderably later.  Latest  of  all  are  the  gospel  and 
epistles  which  were  attributed  in  subsequent  times 
to  the  Apostle  John.  Of  the  much  disputed 
question  as  to  their  Johannine  authorship  I  shall 
speak  later.i  Enough  to  say  now  that  the  whole 
course  and  result  of  historical  criticism  has  been  to 
show  that  the  traditional  view  is  without  any  suffi- 
cient historical  foundation.  The  fourth  Gospel  is 
undoubtedly  a  writing  of  about  the  middle  of  the 
second  century,  and  the  author  is  entirely  unknown. 
It  should  also  be  noted  that  the  earliest  manu- 
script texts  of  the  New  Testament,  as  we  have  it, 
are  as  late  at  least  as  the  fourth  or  fifth  century, 
and  that  it  is  therefore  impossible  to  know  exactly 
what  interpolations  or  additions  had  already  crept 
into  the  original  texts,  though  certain  criteria,  such 
as  other  versions  and  the  writings  of  the  early 
Fathers,  afford  some  grounds  of  critical  judgment. 
With  this  critical  explanation,  we  take  the  New 
Testament  writings  as  we  find  them,  and  ask  what 
evidence  they  give  us  on  the  question  of  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  dogma  of  the  Trinity.  The  earliest 
stratum  of  this  evolution  is  contained  in  the  Book 

1  See,  for  a  full  discussion  of  this  question  in  its  historical 
aspects,  Appendix  A :  —  "  The  Johannine  Problem." 


ATHANASIANISM  7 

of  Acts,  and  in  the  Synoptic  gospels,  with  the 
exception  of  the  opening  chapters  of  Matthew  and 
of  Luke,  which  are  later  additions,  as  we  shall  see 
further  on.  The  doctrine  of  Christ  in  this  first 
stratum  is  distinctly  that  of  Messiahship,  Jesus 
is  a  man  of  God,  sent  of  God  to  declare  his  gospel 
and  exhort  men  to  prepare  for  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  which  is  at  hand.  There  is  no  assertion  of 
Christ's  divinity,  or  of  his  preexistence  and  incar- 
nation, or  even  of  his  miraculous  birth.  Jesus  is 
everywhere  described  as  the  son  of  Joseph  and 
Mary.  The  Book  of  Acts  is  here  of  primary  im- 
portance. Although  it  evidently  contains  quite  a 
large  element  of  legend,  it  is  equally  evident  that 
many  of  its  accounts  belong  to  the  earliest  apostolic 
traditions.  Even  when  compared  with  the  Synoptic 
gospels  it  breathes  an  air  of  historical  freshness 
and  naturalness,  as  if  a  genuine  growth  of  the 
original  soil.  The  whole  picture  of  the  Acts  is 
that  of  a  human  Messiah,  glorified  by  a  divine 
mission.  I  have  already  referred  to  Christ's  own 
account  of  himself  as  recorded  in  the  Synoptic 
gospels.  It  is  essentially  that  of  the  Acts.  There 
is  one  feature,  however,  of  the  narrative  which  is 
common  both  to  Gospels  and  Acts,  that  should  be 
noticed.  I  refer  to  the  miracles.  It  is  a  mistake 
to  suppose  that  the  miracles  were  a  proof  or  in- 
tended to  be  a  proof  of  Christ's  divinity.  The  Bible 
contains  many  miracles  supposed  to  be  wrought 
by  men.  Christ's  disciples  also  wrought  miracles. 
The  Acts  contain  explicit  accounts  of  miracles  per- 


8  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

formed  by  Peter  and  Paul.  Such  miracles  were 
regarded  as  proofs  of  the  power  given  by  God  to 
his  servants,  not  as  proof  that  any  worker  of  them 
was  himself  divine.  Belief  in  such  miraculous 
power  was  universal  in  the  ancient  world. 

The  second  stratum  of  evolution  in  the  New 
Testament  is  found  in  the  opening  chapters  of 
Matthew  and  Luke.  These  chapters  bear  on  their 
very  face  the  plain  marks  of  forming  a  later  ad- 
dition. In  the  first  place,  they  are  historically  in- 
consistent with  the  rest  of  the  gospels.  They 
represent  Jesus  as  born  in  Bethlehem,  while  aU 
the  other  portions,  not  only  of  Matthew  and  Luke, 
but  also  of  the  entire  New  Testament,  make  no 
allusion  to  Bethlehem  as  the  birthplace  of  Jesus, 
and  speak  of  him  everywhere  as  of  Nazareth, 
implying  that  he  was  born  there.  In  the  second 
place,  the  genealogies  in  these  opening  chapters 
are  inconsistent  with  the  rest  of  the  chapters  them- 
selves. They  were  written  to  show  that  Jesus  was 
the  true  Messiah  of  Jewish  prophecy,  who  was  ex- 
pected to  come  in  the  Davidic  line ;  and  this  line 
ran  through  Joseph,  who  was  thus  made  the  natu- 
ral as  well  as  putative  father  of  Jesus.  The  con- 
cluding parts  of  these  genealogies,  in  which  Joseph 
is  referred  to,  bear  marks  of  interpolation  and 
change,  and  the  altered  readings  nullify  the  very 
object  for  which  the  genealogies  were  prepared. 
The  grossly  uncritical  character  of  that  age  is  here 
conspicuous.  With  the  purpose  of  harmonizing  a 
new  legendary  tradition  that  has  grown  up  around 


ATHANASIANISM  9 

Christ's  birth  and  infancy  with  the  older  genealogy, 
this  rude  alteration  of  the  text  is  resorted  to.  The 
ancient  Syriac  manuscript  of  the  gospels,  recently 
discovered  by  Mrs.  Lewis  at  Mt.  Sinai,^  sheds  a 

^  The  most  recent  investigations  tend  to  prove  the  very  early 
date  of  the  Sinaitic  Syriac  manuscript,  and  its  critical  value  and 
authority  in  establishing  the  original  text  of  the  gospels.  Since 
this  book  -was  completed  the  first  installment  of  an  article  of 
g^eat  critical  importance  has  been  published  in  The  American 
Journal  of  Theology,  January,  1900,  on  The  Hist&ry  of  the  New 
Testament  Canon  in  the  Syriac  Church,  by  J.  A.  Brewer.  In  the 
absence  of  external  evidence  the  writer  shows  on  internal  grounds, 
by  a  thorough  analysis  and  comparison  of  the  several  known 
Syriac  versions,  that  the  Sinaitic  version  is  the  earliest  of  all,  which 
fixes  its  date  as  early  as  "  the  middle  of  the  second  century,"  He 
also  concludes  that  this  version  is  based  on  a  Greek  original,  and 
that  this  original  text  is  distinct  from  the  Greek  texts  underlying 
the  other  Syriac  versions ;  which  gives  the  remarkable  result  that 
behind  the  Sinaitic  Syriac  version  is  to  be  found  the  earliest 
known  Greek  text  of  the  gospels.  I  quote  the  critic's  general 
conclusion  on  this  point.  "  Unless  other  finds  show  the  contrary, 
Ss  in  its  original  form  was  the  first  translation  to  which  we  can 
point  with  historic  certainty.  The  extraordinary  value  of  Ss  for 
text-critical  purposes  has  at  once  been  recognized.  It  seems  to 
stand  on  the  same  level  of  authority  as  S  £tnd  B.  Merx  places  it 
even  higher.  Whether  that,  however,  can  be  maintained,  time 
will  show.  But  the  fact  that  Ss  was  written  before  T  (Tatian's 
Diatessaron)  puts  it  into  the  middle  of  the  second  century,  to 
which  the  entire  text  bears  witness  ;  and  that  places  it  in  the  front 
rank  of  the  witnesses  for  the  original  Greek  text  of  the  gospels." 

In  the  course  of  the  investigation  special  attention  is  g^ven 
to  Matt.  i.  16,  19-25,  and  the  writer  shows  by  a  close  comparison 
of  the  different  versions  that  the  Sinaitic  Syriac  version,  which, 
as  we  have  stated  above,  declares  the  real  paternity  of  Joseph, 
represents  the  original  form  of  the  Greek  text,  and  that  the  pro- 
cess of  textual  change  was  from  the  paternity  of  Joseph,  which 
was  necessary  to  prove  the  genealogical  descent  of  Christ  from 
David,  to  an  interpolation  which  avoided  such  paternity  in  the 
interest  of  a  miraculous  virgin  birth.  Thus  the  most  advanced 
scholarship  sustains  what  the  natural  law  of  historical  evolution 


10  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

remarkable  light  on  this  point.  In  that  manu- 
script, Matthew  i.  16,  the  verse  that  concludes  the 
genealogy  reads  thus :  "  Joseph,  to  whom  was  be- 
trothed the  Virgin  Mary,  begat  Jesus  who  is  called 
Christ."  Here  is  a  plain  trace  of  the  original  text, 
though  later  tradition  has  already  begun  to  alter  it 
by  inserting  the  virginity  of  Mary,  so  that  the  two 
parts  of  the  verse  when  compared  in  the  light  of 
the  context  involve  a  palpable  contradiction.  The 
Greek  text,  as  we  have  it,  seems  to  have  suffered 
another  alteration  along  the  same  line :  "  Joseph, 
the  husband  of  Mary,  of  whom  was  born  Jesus 
who  is  called  Christ."  Here  the  paternity  of  Jesus 
is  left  implicitly  undecided,  though  what  follows 
shows  what  was  intended  to  be  inferred.  The  gene- 
alogy given  in  Luke  has  a  similar  curious  addition 
to  what  must  have  been  the  original  text,  "And 
Jesus  himself,  when  he  began  to  teach,  was  about 

and  the  facts  of  history  itself,  so  far  as  they  are  known,  unite  in 
declaring.  The  earliest  Greek  texts  that  have  survived  are  the 
Vatican  and  Sinaitic  manuscripts  (B,  S)  which  cannot  be  earlier 
than  the  fourth  century.  It  is  a  fact  worthy  of  note  that  Justin 
Martyr,  while  holding  to  the  miraculous  virgin  birth,  quoting 
Luke  i.  82,  and  Matt.  i.  21,  makes  no  allusion  to  Matt.  i.  16,  as 
he  surely  would  have  done,  had  it  been  in  the  form  which  ignores 
Joseph's  paternity.  The  same  is  true  of  Origen.  The  only  ante- 
Nicene  Father,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  who  quotes  the  passage  as 
we  now  read  it,  is  Tertullian  (De  Came  Christi,  c.  xx.).  When 
we  realize  how  fluxive  and  unsettled  the  text  of  the  gospels  still 
was,  it  can  be  readily  seen  that  the  text  of  Tertullian  in  North 
Africa  might  be  quite  dijfferent  from  that  of  Justin  Martyr  in 
Syria  or  of  Origen  in  Alexandria.  But  the  point  especially  to  be 
noted  is  that  the  Greek  text  which  lies  behind  the  Sinaitic  Syriac 
version  seems  to  be  more  than  a  half  century  earlier  than  Ter- 
tullian. 


ATHANASIANISM  11 

thirty  years  old,  being  the  son  (as  was  supposed)  of 
Joseph."  How  the  phrase  "as  was  supposed"  got 
in  is  easily  explained.  The  original  object  of  the 
genealogy  was  to  carry  the  line  of  descent  directly 
back  through  Joseph  to  David.  When  the  theory 
of  a  miraculous  birth  from  a  virgin  had  gained 
currency,  "as  was  supposed"  was  apparently  in- 
serted to  cover  the  difficulty.  In  any  case,  the 
real  inconsistency  between  the  plain  object  of  the 
genealogies  and  the  later  theory  of  the  virgin  birth 
remains  conspicuous,  and  shows  that  the  opening 
chapters  of  Matthew  and  Luke,  in  their  present 
shape,  are  later  additions  to  the  original  gospels. 
Scholars  are  to-day  generally  agreed  in  making 
Mark  the  earliest  gospel.  That  Gospel  has  no 
account  of  Christ's  birth  or  infancy,  but  begins 
with  his  public  ministry.  Such,  no  doubt,  was  the 
original  point  of  departure  of  Matthew  and  Luke. 
But  when  tradition  and  legend  had  begun  to  grow 
around  Christ's  earlier  years,  the  opening  chapters 
were  prefixed  to  these  gospels. 

The  new  theory  advanced  in  these  chapters  con- 
cerning Christ  is  that  of  his  true  hmnan  nature 
on  his  mother's  side,  coupled  with  a  superhuman 
miraculous  birth  through  the  agency  of  the  Holy 
Ghost,  thus  making  Christ  a  sort  of  demi-god. 
This  theory  of  the  miraculous  conception  and  birth 
does  not  appear  in  any  other  portion  of  the  New 
Testament,  and  plainly  belongs  chronologically  to 
a  later  date.  Outside  of  the  New  Testament  it 
first  certainly  appears  about  the   middle  of  the 


12  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

second  century  in  the  writings  of  Justin  Martyr,^ 
and  is  made  to  rest  by  him  solely  on  the  Emmanuel 
passage  in  the  seventh  chapter  of  Isaiah,  of  which 
it  is  supposed  to  be  a  distinct  fulfillment,  —  a 
point  borrowed  from  Matthew  i.  22,  23,  The 
passage  in  Isaiah  has  plain  reference  to  events 
occurring  in  the  prophet's  own  day,  but  was  by 
the  early  Christians  regarded  as  a  direct  messianic 
prediction.  The  prophet  declared  that  a  mar- 
riageable young  woman  would  shortly  bear  a  son 
who,  as  a  sign  of  the  fulfillment  of  the  prophecy, 
would  be  called  Emmanuel.  In  the  Septuagint 
Greek  version,  which  was  universally  used  by  the 
Greek-speaking  Jews  of  Christ's  day  and  after, 
the  Hebrew  word  for  "  marriageable  young  wo- 
man "  was  translated  "  a  virgin,"  and  this  mis- 
taken translation  was  made  the  basis  of  the  theory 
of  the  miraculous  birth.  It  is  a  fact  which  bears 
directly  on  the  question  of  the  comparative  late- 
ness of  this  tradition,  that  Justin  Martyr  is  the 
first  of  the  post-apostolic  Fathers  to  quote  the 
accounts  of  the  miraculous  birth  from  Matthew 
and  Luke,  and  he  plainly  follows  the  account  in 
Matthew,  in  making  that  event  a  fulfillment  of  an 

^  It  may  be  asked  what  I  do  with  the  references  in  the  Igna- 
tian  epistles  to  the  virginity  of  Mary.  I  answer  that  most  of 
these  references  are  in  the  longer  recension  which  is  allowed  by 
Lightf  oot  and  scholars  generally  to  be  largely  interpolated  and 
to  belong  to  a  later  age.  As  to  the  one  or  two  allusions  to  the 
subject  in  the  shorter  recension,  I  am  convinced  that  the  shorter 
epistles  are  not  free  from  interpolations,  and  on  the  whole  I  ac- 
cept the  judgment  of  Neander  that  no  use  can  be  made  of  them 
on  any  doubtful  question  of  early  church  history. 


ATHANASIANISM  13 

Old  Testament  prediction.  Justin  Martyr's  whole 
argument  against  the  Jew  Trypho  for  Christ's 
miraculous  birth  indicates  that  it  was  a  question 
under  discussion  among  Christians  as  well  as  among 
their  Jewish  opponents,  and  he  allows  that  "  there 
are  some  who  admit  that  he  is  Christ,  while  hold- 
ing him  to  be  man  of  men,  with  whom  I  do  not 
agree."  This  was  the  position  of  Trypho  himself, 
who  was  made  by  Justin  to  represent  the  Jews  of 
his  day :  "  We  all  expect  that  the  Messiah  will  be 
a  man  born  of  men."  When  we  consider  that 
this  is  the  first  time  that  the  question  is  raised  and 
discussed  in  the  historical  remains  of  the  post- 
apostolic  Fathers,  and  that  the  opening  chapters 
of  Matthew  and  Luke  are  in  this  discussion  first 
introduced  in  defense  of  the  miraculous  birth,  the 
conclusion  is  well-nigh  irresistible  that  these 
chapters  were  a  late  addition  to  the  gospels.  At 
all  events,  the  whole  story  of  the  virginity  of  Mary 
and  of  her  conception  by  the  Holy  Ghost  is  purely 
legendary,  as  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  it  is  closely 
connected  with  other  legendary  traditions,  and  can- 
not be  separated  from  them.  The  account  of  the 
angels  announcing  by  songs  to  shepherds  the  birth 
of  Jesus,  that  of  the  Magi  and  the  star  in  the  east, 
the  massacre  of  the  little  children  by  Herod,  the 
flight  into  Egypt,  are  without  any  historical  basis. 
They  belong  to  a  later  time  when  legend  had  be- 
gun its  work  around  the  facts  of  Christ's  early 
life,  the  results  of  which  are  seen  in  the  so-called 
apocryphal  gospels  and  acts  of  apostles  and  disci- 


14  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

pies.  There  is  a  whole  volume  extant  of  these 
legendary  writings  in  which  Jesus  and  Mary  are 
the  principal  actors.  The  childhood  of  Christ  is 
filled  with  marvels.  But  the  legendary  history  of 
Mary  has  the  most  remarkable  growth.  Her  birth, 
like  that  of  her  son,  becomes  miraculous  and  im- 
maculate, and  she  herself  is  elevated  into  a  sort 
of  divinity,  and  the  way  is  thus  prepared  for  the 
cultus  of  the  Virgin  Mary  in  the  Catholic  Church. 
The  opening  chapters  of  Matthew  and  Luke  are 
simply  extracts  from  such  apocryphal  narratives. 
The  legendary  accounts  of  these  chapters  are  quite 
independent  of  each  other  and  wholly  irreconcil- 
able with  each  other,  as  is  evident  at  once  when 
they  are  compared.  It  is  true  that  there  are  still 
biblical  scholars  who  attempt  to  defend  the  his- 
toricity and  harmony  of  these  accounts.  But  such 
attempts  are  worse  than  vain,  and  I  need  not  dwell 
on  them.  Legend  has  always  played  a  prominent 
part  in  history  and  biography,  especially  in  uncrit- 
ical times.  Ancient  literature  is  full  of  similar 
legends,  having  their  background  in  the  mytholo- 
gies of  primeval  ages.  Gods  and  goddesses  were 
fathers  and  mothers  of  many  a  legendary  hero, 
and  a  halo  of  supernatural  birth  and  ancestry  soon 
surrounded  historical  men  of  renown.  Buddha 
was  a  real  historical  personage,  but  later  legend 
made  his  birth  miraculous  from  a  virgin  mother. 
The  same  legendary  element  appears  in  the  life  of 
Zoroaster,  the  ancient  Persian  sage.  Even  Plato 
did  not  escape  a  partial  divinization.    Later  Greek 


ATHANASIANISM  15 

tradition  made  his  father  the  god  Apollo.  Nor 
did  this  superstition  of  miracidous  human  births, 
through  a  divine  parentage,  cease  with  the  ad- 
vent of  Christianity.  The  famous  "  Secret  His- 
tory "  attributed  to  Procopius  informs  us  that 
the  mother  of  Justinian  declared  that  his  father 
was  a  demon. 

I  have  introduced  this  stage  of  trinitarian  evolu- 
tion, in  which  Christ's  miraculous,  superhuman 
birth  is  set  forth,  as  the  second  stratum  of  devel- 
opment, because  it  logically  belongs  here.  It  is  a 
direct  evolution  of  the  Palestinian  synoptic  tradi- 
tion, and  is  based  on  the  Messiahship  of  Jesus  as 
set  forth  in  the  Acts  and  in  the  Synoptic  gospels. 
It  was  natural,  therefore,  that  the  chapters  which 
contain  this  new  dogma  should  be  prefixed  to 
Matthew  and  Luke.  They  are  distinguishable 
from  the  remaining  portions  of  these  gospels  in 
this,  that  they  illustrate  the  growing  disposition  to 
find  proofs  of  Jesus'  Messiahship  in  the  Old  Tes- 
tament; and  it  was  thus  from  certain  supposed 
messianic  predictions  in  the  later  prophets  that  the 
unhistorical  tradition  of  Christ's  miraculous  birth 
in  Bethlehem  was  derived.  The  opening  chapters 
of  Matthew  make  this  event  to  be  the  direct  fulfill- 
ment of  Isaiah  vii.  14  and  of  Micah  v.  2  ;  and  it 
is  important  to  note  that  Justin  Martyr  gives  no 
other  ground  for  his  acceptance  of  the  dogma  of 
the  miraculous  birth  than  the  one  given  in  Mat- 
thew, and  that  Origen,  the  most  learned  of  the 
early  Christian  Fathers,  defends   it  against   the 


1/ 


16  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

objections  of  Celsus  on  the  same  ground.  Origen 
was  scholar  enough  to  know  that  the  Hebrew 
word  translated  "  virgin  "  in  the  Septuagint  ver- 
sion did  not  necessarily  mean  virgin,  but  he  in- 
sisted that  such  was  the  meaning  in  the  passage, 
assuming  the  divine  inspiration  of  the  prophet  to 
predict  the  exact  circumstances  of  the  birth  of  the 
Messiah  whose  advent  was  to  be  several  centuries 
later,  and  also  assuming  that  the  miraculous  birth 
of  Jesus  from  a  virgin  in  Bethlehem  was  a  his- 
torical fact.  Thus  it  plainly  appears  that  the  idea 
of  the  miraculous  birth  did  not  come  from  Alex- 
andrian Greek  sources,  but  is  of  Jewish  Palestinian 
origin,  though  not  necessarily  from  Jewish  Chris- 
tians. This  helps  to  explain  the  entire  absence  of 
the  tradition  from  the  fourth  Gospel.  A  divine 
incarnation  and  a  miraculous  birth  have  no  neces- 
sary connection,  though  later  Christian  theology 
brought  them  together.  It  is  a  notable  fact  that 
they  are  kept  wholly  apart  in  the  New  Testament. 
There  is  no  incarnation  in  the  opening  chapters  of 
Matthew  and  Luke,  and  there  is  no  miraculous 
birth  from  a  virgin  in  any  other  part  of  the  New 
Testament. 

But  while  this  dogma  holds  its  place  logically  as 
closely  following  the  messianic  doctrine  of  the 
Synoptic  gospels,  it  must  not  be  inferred  that  it 
chronologically  follows  these  gospels  in  the  histor- 
ical evolution  of  Christian  literature  and  thought. 
The  exact  date  of  the  opening  chapters  of  Matthew 
and  Luke  cannot  be  given,  but  there  is  little  doubt 


ATHANASIANISM  17 

that  they  belong  to  a  period  subsequent  to  that  of 
all  the  other  New  Testament  writings.  The  only- 
question  would  be  as  to  the  fourth  Gospel.  But 
that  gospel  knows  nothing  of  the  miraculous  birth 
in  Bethlehem  or  of  the  virginity  of  Mary.  Joseph 
is  the  reputed  father  of  Jesus,  and  Nazareth  is 
supposed  to  be  the  place  where  he  was  born,  as  is 
shown  in  the  argument  of  the  Jews  against  the 
claim  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah.  "  But  some 
said :  What !  doth  the  Christ  come  out  of  Galilee  ? 
Hath  not  the  scripture  said  that  the  Christ  Com- 
eth of  the  seed  of  David,  and  from  Bethlehem,  the 
village  where  David  was  ?  "  (John  vii.  41,  42.) 
In  this  argument  the  implied  minor  premise  is 
that  Jesus  was  in  fact  born  in  Nazareth.  How 
then  could  he  be  the  true  Messiah !  It  is  to  be 
noted  that  not  the  slightest  doubt  is  expressed  on 
that  point,  showing  again  how  late  must  have  been 
the  introduction  into  the  Christian  tradition  of 
the  legend  of  the  miraculous  birth  in  Bethlehem. 
This  does  not  make  the  priority  of  the  fourth  Gos- 
pel to  the  opening  chapters  of  Matthew  and  Luke 
certain,  but,  so  far  as  the  evidence  goes,  it  points 
directly  that  way. 

The  third  stratum  of  trinitarian  evolution  is 
marked  by  the  intrusion  of  Greek  philosophical 
thought  into  the  Jewish  Palestinian.  The  first 
two  strata  belong  to  Palestinian  Aramaic  soil,  but 
the  third  stratum,  which  is  introduced  by  the  Epis- 
tles of  Paul  and  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  is  of 
Alexandrian  Greek  origin  and  character.     Paul 


18  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

was  a  Jew,  and  trained  in  Jewish  schools  ;  but  he 
also  had  a  Greek  education,  and  his  epistles  bear 
plain  marks  of  his  acquaintance  with  Greek  philo- 
sophic literature.  It  is  an  interesting  question 
whether  he  had  actually  read  the  writings  of  the 
Alexandrian  Jewish  Philo.  This  cannot  be  con- 
clusively proved,  but  there  are  some  remarkable 
coincidences  of  thought  and  expression  between  the 
two  writers.  At  all  events,  it  must  be  conceded 
that  Paul  was  at  home  in  the  atmosphere  of  Phi- 
Ionic  thought,  and  we  may  be  quite  sure  that  he 
owed  the  real  starting-point  of  his  new  theological 
departure  indirectly  if  not  directly  to  Philo  himself ; 
for  his  doctrine  of  Christ  as  a  /xco-itt/s  (mediator) 
between  God  and  men,  with  all  its  metaphysical 
results,  is  an  integral  feature  of  the  Philonic  Logos 
doctrine.  The  very  term  /xco-tViys,  which  first  ap- 
pears in  Paul  among  Christian  writers,  was  used 
by  Philo  again  and  again.  The  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews  gives  equally  clear  evidence  of  Alexan- 
drian and  Philonic  relationship.  It  is  a  most  re- 
markable and  significant  fact  that  )u,€ortTr;s,  in  the 
special  sense  of  a  metaphysical  go-between  or  medi- 
ator between  God  and  mankind,  is  found  only  in 
Philo,  Paul,  and  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  The 
reason  why  it  was  not  employed  in  later  Christian 
writers  was  that  Aoyo?  took  its  place.  The  media- 
tion theory  of  Paul  was  retained,  but  it  assumed 
the  form  of  the  Logos  doctrine.  The  /Aeo-tV*;?  doc- 
trine of  Paul  and  the  Xoyo?  doctrine  of  Justin 
Martyr,  as  we  shall  see,  have  one  essentially  com- 


ATHANASIANISM  19 

mon  source,  viz.,  the  Greek  Platonic  philosophy. 
How  providential  Paul's  Greek  training  was  to  him 
and  to  the  development  of  Christian  thought  is 
easily  seen.  The  original  language  of  the  Gospel 
was  Aramaic,  a  development  of  the  Hebrew,  and 
there  is  no  good  evidence  that  Christ  or  any  of  his 
immediate  disciples  spoke  any  other  tongue.  Paul, 
on  the  contrary,  both  preached  and  wrote  in  Greek, 
and  hence  it  was  that  he  was  so  preeminently  fitted 
to  be  the  apostle  to  the  Gentiles,  and  to  interpret 
the  Palestinian  Jewish  gospel  of  Christ  to  the 
Grseco-Roman  world.  The  Gentile  churches  which 
Paul  organized,  and  to  which  he  preached  and 
wrote,  were  unacquainted  with  the  Hebrew  lan- 
guage and  literature  and  were  trained  in  Greek 
religious  and  philosophical  ideas.  This  is  the  his- 
torical explanation  of  the  entirely  new  stage  of 
christological  thought.  It  is  marked  by  the  transi- 
tion from  Palestinian  to  Greek  soil.  Through  Paul 
the  gospel  passed  from  the  world  of  Judaism  into 
the  world  of  Greek  philosophy.  No  other  apostle 
had  such  a  wide  influence  or  fame  as  he,  as  is  shown 
by  the  preservation  of  so  many  of  his  letters,  and 
by  the  frequent  quotations  from  them  in  the  ear- 
liest post-apostolic  writings.  The  prominence  of 
Peter  forms  a  later  chapter,  and  was  ecclesiastical 
rather  than  theological,  growing  out  of  the  fiction 
of  his  relation  to  the  Roman  Church.  The  silence 
of  the  early  Fathers  concerning  John  is  remark- 
able, as  is  also  the  absence  of  all  allusion  to  the 
Gospel  that  is  named  from  him.     In  Clement,  in 


20  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Polycarp,  and  in  the  shorter  epistles  of  Ignatius, 
there  are  quite  a  number  of  references  to  Paul,  but 
not  one  to  John.  It  is  certainly  significant  that 
Polycarp,  who  was  said  by  Irenaeus  to  have  been 
a  hearer  of  John,  should  refer  to  Paul  four  times, 
and  quote  from  all  his  epistles,  with  a  single  ex- 
ception, repeatedly,  while  a  complete  silence  is 
preserved  concerning  John  and  the  fourth  Gospel. 
We  are  thus  prepared  to  understand  the  signifi- 
cance of  Paul  in  this  survey  of  the  historical  evo- 
lution of  the  trinitarian  dogma.  This  dogma,  as 
it  was  finally  developed  by  the  theologians  of  the 
third  and  fourth  centuries,  is  essentially  Greek, 
not  Jewish ;  Alexandrian,  not  Palestinian ;  and  to 
Paul  we  must  look  for  its  real  beginnings.  He 
laid  the  foundations  of  the  metaphysical  bridge  by 
which  Judaism  in  its  Christianized  form  passed 
over  to  Greek  philosophical  thought,  to  be  meta- 
morphosed by  it  into  a  Graeco-Christian  theology. 
Before  Paul  there  had  been  no  suggestion  of  trin- 
ity; God  was  "one  God."  Christ  was  "a  man 
approved  of  God  unto  men  by  mighty  works  which 
God  did  by  him."  He  was  God's  "  holy  servant," 
"  a  prophet,"  "  anointed  one,"  "  exalted  by  God  to 
be  a  prince  and  a  Saviour."  The  Acts,  from  which 
these  quotations  are  taken,  are  full  of  such  expres- 
sions, and  they  clearly  represent  the  christology  of 
Paul's  day.  The  Synoptic  gospels  are  here  in  close 
harmony  with  the  Acts.  The  Jewish  Christian 
Messianism  is  the  fundamental  doctrine  through- 
out.    Christ  is  Messiah,  Son  of  man,  Master,  mes- 


ATHANASIANISM  21 

senger  of  God ;  but  he  is  nowhere  metaphysically 
distinguished  from  other  men,  as  if  his  nature  was 
superhuman  or  divine.  It  was  Paul  who  with  his 
Greek  Philonic  theory  of  a  metaphysical  superhu- 
man mediator  gave  an  entirely  new  shaping  to  the 
messianic  doctrine,  and  he  may  be  truly  called  the 
real  originator  of  the  trinitarian  conception  which 
finally  issued  in  the  Nicene  creed. 

What,  then,  was  the  doctrine  of  Paul  concern- 
ing God  and  Christ  ?  He  nowhere  gives  us  a  full 
metaphysical  statement.  It  is  not  clear  that  he 
had  developed  any  precise  theological  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity.  Certainly  his  view  of  the  third  per- 
son is  indefinite;  and  it  is  doubtful  whether  he 
regarded  the  Holy  Spirit  as  a  personal  being.  In 
the  two  passages  which  contain  his  most  discrimi- 
nating utterances  on  the  subject  of  the  Godhead, 
the  Holy  Spirit  is  not  mentioned ;  "  To  us  there  is 
one  God,  the  Father,  of  whom  are  all  things,  and 
we  unto  him ;  and  one  Lord,  Jesus  Christ,  through 
whom  are  all  things,  and  we  through  him  "  (1  Cor. 
viii.  6).  "  There  is  one  God,  one  mediator  also 
between  God  and  men,  himself  man,  Christ  Jesus  " 
(1  Tim.  ii.  6).  These  passages  have  a  credal  ring, 
and,  together  with  the  baptismal  formula,  seem  to 
be  the  basis  of  the  early  confessions.  Two  points 
bearing  upon  the  question  of  the  Trinity  stand  out 
clearly.  First,  Paul  remained  a  firm  adherent  of 
the  Jewish  monotheism.  To  him,  as  to  Moses  and 
to  Christ,  God  was  a  single  personal  being — "the 
Father,"  "  the  blessed  and  only  potentate,"  "  whom 


22  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

no  man  hatli  seen,  nor  can  see."  Secondly,  Paul 
distinguished  Christ  from  God,  as  a  personal  being, 
and  regarded  him,  moreover,  as  essentially  inferior 
and  subordinate  to  the  supreme  Deity.  I  do  not 
press  the  point  here  that  Paul,  in  the  second  pas- 
sage quoted,  expressly  calls  Christ  a  man,  in  direct 
antithesis  with  God.  Other  passages  make  it  plain 
that  the  apostle  conceived  of  Christ  as  superhuman 
and  preexistent  and  as  having  a  certain  metaphy- 
sical relation  to  God.  But  that  Paul  ever  con- 
founded Christ  with  God  himself,  or  regarded  him 
as  in  any  way  the  supreme  Divinity,  is  a  position 
invalidated  not  only  by  direct  statements,  but  also 
by  the  whole  drift  of  his  epistles.  The  central 
feature  of  Paul's  christology  is  its  doctrine  of 
mediatorship :  "  One  God,  the  Father,  and  one 
mediator  between  God  and  men."  This  is  a  theo- 
logical advance  on  the  messianic  doctrine  of  the 
Synoptic  gospels.  Messiahship  is  the  doctrine  of  a 
"  Son  of  Man ;  "  mediatorship  is  the  doctrine  of 
a  "  Son  of  God."  Paul  gives  no  evidence  of  ac- 
quaintance with  the  Logos  doctrine,  but  he  antici- 
pates it.  He  exalts  Christ  above  all  human  beings. 
If  he  does  not  clothe  him  with  the  supreme  attri- 
butes of  Deity,  he  places  him  next  to  God  in 
nature,  honor,  and  power ;  so  that,  while  remaining 
a  monotheist,  he  takes  a  long  step  toward  a  mono- 
theistic trinitarianism,  giving  us  the  one  only  trini- 
tarian  benediction  of  the  New  Testament  (2  Cor. 
xiii.  14). 

Passing  to  the  post-apostolic  age,  we  find  that 


ATHANASIANISM  23 

these  two  articles  of  Paul's  doctrine  form  the  basis 
of  the  faith  of  the  church.  Not  only  so,  they  con- 
tinue to  be  the  characteristic  and  fundamental 
features  of  the  Greek  Trinitarianism  through  the 
whole  course  of  its  development.  From  beginning 
to  end,  Greek  theology  is  distinctly  monotheistic. 
Clement  writes :  "  As  God  lives  and  as  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  lives."  So  Athenagoras :  "  We  ac- 
knowledge a  God,  and  a  Son,  his  Logos,  and  a  Holy 
Spirit."  So  Dionysius  of  Rome :  "  We  must  be- 
lieve on  God  the  Father  Omnipotent,  and  on  Jesus 
Christ  his  Son,  and  on  the  Holy  Spirit."  The 
Nicene  creed,  in  which  Greek  orthodoxy  culmi- 
nated, continues  the  strain  in  language  which  is 
a  clear  echo  of  Paul  himself :  "  We  believe  in  one 
God,  the  Father  almighty,"  "  and  in  one  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  the  Son  of  God,  begotten  of  the  Fa- 
ther." To  be  sure,  the  Son  of  God  is  also  called 
God  in  the  added  phrase,  "  God  of  God ;  "  but 
"  God  "  is  here  descriptive,  in  the  sense  of  divine, 
since  the  Son  of  God  is  begotten  of  the  Father  and 
hence  of  the  same  divine  nature.  The  Father  is 
God  in  the  primary  or  supreme  sense.  Christ  as 
Son  is  God  only  in  a  derived  or  secondary  sense. 
As  the  evolution  of  church  doctrine  went  on,  the 
trinitarian  element  grew  more  explicit  and  com- 
plete, but  the  original  Pauline  monotheism  was 
never  given  up.  In  fact,  the  more  pronounced  the 
Greek  Trinitarianism  became,  the  more  tenaciously 
its  monotheism  was  declared  and  vindicated.  God, 
the  Father,  the  eternal  cause  of  all  things,  was 


24  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

never  confounded  with  either  of  the  other  persons, 
or  with  the  Trinity  as  a  whole. 

The  same  is  true  of  Paul's  doctrine  of  mediator- 
ship.  It  also  became  a  vital  feature  of  Greek 
theology,  and  remained  its  moulding  principle 
through  all  its  history.  A  difference,  however,  is 
to  be  noted.  The  doctrine  of  monotheism  natu- 
rally lay  in  the  background,  as  a  fixed  quantity, 
being  assumed  always  as  a  cardinal  truth  of  Chris- 
tianity which  had  its  birth  on  Jewish  monotheistic 
ground,  and  carefully  avoided  all  connection  with 
the  pagan  polytheism.  Not  so  with  the  doctrine 
of  Christ's  mediatorship.  This  was  the  new  truth 
of  Christianity.  Theologically,  Christianity  is  a 
christology.  Its  Trinitarianism  started  out  of  its 
doctrine  of  Christ  as  the  Son  of  God  and  the 
mediator  between  God  and  man.  Around  this 
point  the  early  controversies  arose,  and  here  began 
a  christological  evolution  which  became  the  central 
factor  of  Greek  ecclesiastical  history  through  its 
whole  course.  This  evolution  must  be  fully  com- 
prehended, if  we  would  understand  the  Nicene 
Trinitarianism.  It  may  be  naturally  divided  into 
four  sections  or  stages,  represented  by  the  names 
of  Paul,  Justin  Martyr,  Origen,  and  Athanasius. 

The  faith  of  the  sub-apostolic  age  remained 
essentially  Pauline.  It  is  truly  represented  in  the 
primitive  portions  of  the  so-caUed  Apostles'  creed. 
Christ  was  regarded  as  a  superhuman  being,  above 
all  angels  and  inferior  only  to  God  himself,  pre- 
existent,  appearing  among  men  from  the  heavenly 


ATHANASIANISM  25 

world,  the  true  Son  of  God,  and  hence  in  a  sense 
God,  as  of  divine  nature,  though  not  the  Supreme 
One.  But  no  further  metaphysics  is  yet  attempted. 
There  is  no  Logos  doctrine.  This  doctrine  which 
was  to  so  change  the  whole  current  of  Christian 
thought,  and  give  such  an  impulse  to  the  spirit  of 
metaphysical  speculation,  first  appears  in  Justin 
Martyr. 

The  question  here  arises  and  cannot  be  ignored : 
What  place  should  be  given  in  this  evolution  to 
the  fourth  Gospel  ?  The  question  of  actual  date 
does  not  now  concern  us.  The  point  is:  When 
does  the  fourth  Gospel  appear  in  history  as  a  docu- 
ment to  which  theological  appeal  is  made  ?  Cer- 
tainly the  two  questions  are  closely  connected,  and 
I  would  here  declare  my  conviction  that  no  satis- 
factory conclusion  can  be  reached  on  the  Johan- 
nine  problem,  until  the  historical  facts  as  to  the 
relation  of  the  fourth  Gospel  to  the  origin  of  the 
Logos  doctrine  are  properly  weighed.  Three  facts 
especially  are  to  be  considered.  First,  setting 
aside  the  fourth  Gospel  itseK,  no  trace  of  a  Logos 
doctrine  appears  in  the  early  church  until  Justin 
Martyr;  that  is,  more  than  a  century  after  the 
death  of  Christ.  Secondly,  none  of  the  post- 
apostolic  Fathers  before  Justin  Martyr  allude  to 
the  fourth  Gospel  or  quote  from  it.^     Thirdly, 

^  I  leave  out  of  account  the  Ignatian  Epistles,  which,  if  genu- 
ine, are  so  greatly  interpolated  as  to  be  unworthy  of  confidence, 
and  also  the  Epistle  to  Diognetus,  which  is  now  properly  regarded 
as  of  later  date.  The  Teaching  of  the  Twelve  Apostles,  the 
Epistles  of  Clement,  of  Barnabas,  of  Polycarp,  the  Shepherd  of 


26  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Justin  Martyr  plainly  draws  his  Logos  doctrine 
from  Greek  philosophic  sources,  never  quoting  the 
fourth  Gospel  by  name  in  defense  of  it,  and  never 
even  referring  to  the  Gospel  at  all,  so  that  it  is 
still  a  disputed  question  whether  he  was  directly 
acquainted  with  it.  Whatever  be  the  truth  on 
this  point,  it  does  not  affect  the  fact  with  which  we 
are  now  concerned,  viz.,  that  so  far  as  the  light 
of  early  church  history  goes,  the  Logos  doctrine  is 
not  shown  to  be  of  apostolic  origin,  or  drawn  from 
the  fourth  Gospel.  If  this  gospel  is  Johannine,  it 
was,  for  some  reason,  not  in  general  circulation 
before  Justin  Martyr's  time,  and  was  not  quoted 
in  connection  with  the  Logos  doctrine  till  quite 
late  in  the  second  century.  To  assume  that  the 
fourth  Gospel  was  written  by  the  Apostle  John, 
and  then  conclude  that  the  Logos  doctrine  of  the 
post-apostolic  church  is  Johannine  and  apostolic, 
against  evidence  of  the  clearest  sort  to  the  contrary, 
is  one  of  the  most  vicious  and  fallacious  of  syllo- 
gisms. I  regret  to  say  that  this  style  of  reasoning 
is  not  yet  extinct.^ 

Hennas,  the  Fragments  of  Papias,  and  the  recently  discovered 
Apology  of  Aristides,  make  no  allusion  to  a  Logos  doctrine  or  to 
the  fourth  Gospel. 

^  See,  for  one  illustration,  Gloag,  Introduction  to  the  Johannine 
Writings,  p.  189 :  "  The  doctrine  of  the  Logos  frequently  occurs 
in  the  writings  of  the  Fathers,  especially  of  Justin  Martyr.  They 
derived  their  notions  concerning  it  from  the  Gospel  of  John." 
In  his  preface  the  writer  allows  that  "  the  authenticity  of  John's 
Gospel  is  the  great  question  of  modem  criticism,  and  must  he 
regarded  as  still  unsettled."  Yet  here  he  assumes  this  "  unset- 
tled question  "  to  he  a  fact,  and  then  assumes  that  Justin  Martyr 
was  acquainted  with  the  fourth  Gospel,  and  derived  his  Logos 


ATHANASIANISM  27 

As  to  the  origin  of  the  Logos  doctrine  in  gen- 
eral there  can  be  no  question.  It  has  no  Jewish 
ancestry.  The  Logos  doctrine  is  essentially  a 
mediation  doctrine.  It  is  based  on  the  idea  of  the 
divine  transcendence  and  of  a  cosmological  void 
needing  to  be  filled  between  the  absolute  God  and 
the  world.  Jewish  theology  held  indeed  to  the 
divine  transcendence ;  but  by  its  doctrine  of  cresr 
tion,  involving  a  direct  creative  act,  and  of  man 
as  formed  in  the  divine  image,  it  brought  God 
into  the  closest  relations  with  all  his  creatures, 
and  especially  with  man  himself.  God  walking 
in  the  garden  and  conversing  with  Adam  is  a  pic- 
ture of  the  whole  Old  Testament  conception  of 
God's  immediate  connection  with  the  human  race. 
In  fact,  there  lurks  in  Jewish  thought  a  strong 

doctrine  from  it.  A  similar  piece  of  false  reasoning  occurs  in 
regard  to  a  quotation  in  the  Epistle  of  Polycarp  from  the  first 
Epistle  of  John  (p.  101).  Polycarp  does  not  allude  to  John  any- 
"where  in  his  Epistle,  nor  does  he  g^ve  the  authorship  of  the 
quotation ;  yet  Dr.  Gloag,  assuming  that  the  author  of  the  fourth 
Gospel  and  the  first  Epistle  of  John  is  the  same,  concludes  :  "  We 
have  then  the  testimony  of  Polycarp  in  proof  of  the  genuineness 
of  John's  Gospel,  and  this  testimony  is  of  great  importance,  as 
Polycarp  was  the  disciple  of  John."  Observe  how  the  testimony 
of  IrensBus,  a  generation  later,  as  to  Polycarp's  relation  to  John, 
is  here  used  to  prop  up  a  conclusion  that  is  wholly  without  foun- 
dation. The  question  is  not  whether  Polycarp  was  acquainted  with 
John,  but  whether  he  gives  any  evidence  of  acquaintance  with 
the  reputed  Gospel  of  John.  There  is  not  a  hint  of  it  in  his 
Epistle,  or  even  that  he  knew  John  at  all.  To  assume  that 
John  wrote  both  (Jospel  and  Epistle,  and  then  that  Polycarp,  as 
a  disciple  of  John,  must  have  been  acquainted  with  both  Gospel 
and  Epistle,  and  then  to  argue  from  an  anonymous  quotation  from 
the  Epistle  that  the  Gospel  is  Johannine,  is  a  flagrant  petitio 
principii. 


28  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tincture  of  divine  immanence  in  its  whole  theory 
of  theophanies,  and  most  of  all  in  its  conception 
of  "  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  "  moving  directly  upon 
human  souls.  Thus  no  basis  was  laid  in  Jewish 
theology  for  the  growth  of  a  Logos  doctrine. 
The  "  Wisdom  "  of  the  Proverbs  is  simply  a  poet- 
ical personification  of  the  divine  attribute.  Christ 
has  much  to  say  of  his  close  relation  to  God,  and 
of  his  mission  to  men  ;  but  it  was  a  mission  based 
on  spiritual  needs,  soteriological,  not  cosmological. 
The  term  Logos  he  never  uses,  and  the  conception 
was  quite  foreign  to  him.  Had  the  Logos  mediar 
tion  doctrine  been  a  product  of  Jewish  thought,  it 
would  certainly  have  appeared  in  Paul ;  but  he 
gives  no  hint  of  it.  We  have  indeed  his  doctrine 
of  Christ's  mediatorship  in  a  new  form,  and  the 
beginnings  of  a  cosmological  view  of  Christ's 
nature,  as  being  "  the  image  of  the  invisible  God, 
the  first-born  of  all  creation ;  "  but  this  is  Greek, 
not  Jewish,  and  gives  evidence  of  his  acquaintance 
with  Greek  philosophy.  For  it  is  in  Greek  phi- 
losophy that  the  sources  of  the  Logos  doctrine  are 
to  be  found.  It  first  appeared  in  the  cosmological 
Asia  Minor  school,  in  the  sixth  century  B.  c,  to 
explain  the  order  of  the  world,  as  a  principle  of 
reason  and  law.  As  such  it  was  employed  by 
Heraclitus  and  Anaxagoras.  When  the  dualistic 
school  of  Plato  arose,  it  became  the  mediating 
principle  between  the  transcendent  spiritual  sphere 
and  the  world  of  phenomena.  It  also  appeared  in 
Stoicism,  to  sustain  its  doctrine  of  a  divine  imma- 


ATHANASIANISM  29 

nence  in  nature.  Thus  the  Logos  as  a  divine 
principle  with  mediating  functions  had  a  long  his- 
tory in  Greek  philosophy  before  it  became  chris- 
tologized  in  the  early  church.  Justin  Martyr 
directly  refers  to  Platonic  and  Stoic  authorities 
for  his  Logos  ideas.  He  was  himself  a  Platonist 
before  he  became  a  Christian,  and  he  never  laid 
aside  his  philosopher's  cloak.  He  believed  that 
Greek  philosophy  was  a  partial  revelation  of  divine 
truth,  and  he  drew  from  it  weapons  to  be  used  in 
the  service  of  Christian  dogma.  Justin  belonged 
to  the  school  of  Paul,  and  in  his  hands  the  Pauline 
form  of  doctrine  was  not  essentially  modified.  The 
new  Logos  ideas  fitted  quite  closely  to  Paul's  own. 

But  three  points  are  noticeable  in  the  Logos 
doctrine,  which  became  fountain  heads  of  tenden- 
cies that  were  finally  to  change  the  whole  current 
of  theological  thought,  and  to  substitute  for  the 
Pauline  christology  something  radically  different. 

First,  the  Logos  doctrine  emphasized  the  super- 
human or  divine  element  in  Christ's  nature.  Paul 
again  and  again  called  Christ  a  man.  But  he 
also  gave  him  a  preexistence  and  "  form  of  God  " 
which  distinguished  him  from  merely  human  beings, 
and  thus  laid  a  cosmological  basis  for  his  mediator- 
ship.  It  is  here  that  the  Logos,  doctrine  comes 
in.  The  philosophical  Logos  was  essentially  cos- 
mological and  metaphysical.  It  was  a  necessary 
bond  of  communication  between  the  world  of  spir- 
itual intelligences  and  this  lower  world  of  time  and 
sense.     In  itself,  whether  as  an  impersonal  princi- 


30  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

pie  or  as  a  personal  being,  it  was  utterly  aloof  from 
earth ;  but  its  great  function  was  mediatorial,  and 
thus  in  its  relationships  it  touched  both  spheres. 
When  Jesus  Christ  was  identified  with  the  Logos, 
his  whole  being  was  transcendentalized.  His  hu- 
man and  earthly  features  were  transfigured,  and 
lost  in  the  higher  glory.  He  was  no  longer  the 
Son  of  man,  but  the  Son  of  God,  and  even  a  quasi 
divinity.  The  whole  point  of  view  was  changed. 
Paul  starts  with  the  human  and  proceeds  to  the 
divine.  The  Logos  doctrine  reverses  the  process. 
As  a  consequence,  while  Paul  never  lost  sight  of 
Christ's  real  humanity,  the  Logos  theology  was  in 
danger  at  once  of  regarding  Christ  as  essentially 
a  transcendent  being  descending  from  the  higher 
sphere,  and  entering  human  relations  in  a  sort  of 
disguise.  This  danger  brought  forth  its  natural 
fruit  in  the  later  monophysite  heresies. 

Secondly,  the  Logos  doctrine  in  its  assertion  of 
Christ's  mediatorship  emphasized  the  subordina- 
tion element  which  characterizes  Paul's  christology, 
and  tended  to  magnify  it.  It  is  the  essence  of  the 
Logos  doctrine  that  the  Logos  mediates  between 
what  is  higher  than  itself  and  what  is  lower.  He 
is  a  middle  being  both  in  nature  and  function.  > 
Such  is  the  mediating  principle  of  Plato,  the  demon 
of  Plutarch,  the  Logos  of  Philo.  This  cosmologi- 
cal  view,  treating  the  Logos  principle  as  necessary 
and  immanent  in  the  universe,  and  not  as  intro- 
duced providentially  into  the  moral  order  in  con- 
sequence of  sin,  now  came  into  Christian  theology. 


ATHANASIANISM  31 

Paul  started  it,  but  the  Logos  doctrine  completed 
it.  In  this  view  the  subordination  element  is  vital, 
and  it  became  the  governing  note  of  the  whole 
Logos  school.  Justin  Martyr's  doctrine  of  Christ 
was  that  of  a  Son  of  God,  wholly  removed  in  his 
preincamate  existence  from  the  human  sphere,  and 
yet  as  completely  distinguished  from  the  Supreme 
Being.  He  regards  the  Logos  of  God  as  originally 
immanent  in  God,  as  the  divine  reason,  and  then 
at  a  point  in  time  evolved  into  a  personal  existence 
of  sonship  and  mediating  activity.  This  develop- 
ment of  the  Logos  into  personality  is  by  the  divine 
wiU.  Thus  the  Son  of  God  is  subordinate  to  the 
Father  in  all  things,  though  having  his  origin  in 
the  Father's  essence.  Justin  was  philosophically 
a  Platonic  transcendentalist.  The  Supreme  Being 
was  in  his  view  invisible  and  unapproachable. 
Hence  his  idea  that  the  Jehovah  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment in  his  various  theophanies  was  not  the  Father 
but  the  Son  or  Logos.  He  found  traces  of  the 
Logos  even  in  pagan  philosophy  and  faith,  and  in 
the  lives  of  such  men  as  Socrates. 

A  third  feature  of  the  Logos  doctrine  was  to  be 
still  more  influential  in  radically  remoulding  Greek 
Christian  thought.  I  refer  to  its  purely  metaphy- 
sical and  speculative  character.  The  Logos  doc- 
trine may  be  true,  but  if  so,  its  truth  is  metaphy- 
sical, not  historical.  The  Christ  of  history  is  not 
a  speculation  of  Greek  philosophy.  The  introduc- 
tion of  the  Logos  doctrine  into  Christian  theology, 
giving  a  new  shape  as  it  did  to  the  entire  content 


32  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

of  faith,  wrought  an  immense  change  in  its  whole 
spirit  and  direction.  Instead  of  resting  on  histori- 
cal facts,  it  now  built  itself  on  certain  speculative 
assumptions.  This  is  the  secret  of  the  remark- 
able change  from  the  confessional  character  of  the 
Apostles'  creed  to  the  transcendental  metaphysics 
of  Nice  and  Chalcedon.  It  is  a  fact  which  theo- 
logians have  been  slow  to  learn,  that  the  metaphy- 
sical words  so  freely  used  by  the  Greek  Fathers  in 
theological  controversy  were  all  borrowed  from  the 
philosophical  nomenclature  of  Plato  and  Aristotle. 
This  becomes  especially  apparent  in  what  may  be 
called  the  scholastic  period  of  Greek  theology,  and 
is  well  illustrated  by  John  of  Damascus,  who  pre- 
faces his  great  work,  "  On  the  Orthodox  Faith," 
with  an  explanatory  dictionary  of  Aristotelean 
terms. 

Before  proceeding  to  Origen,  it  is  proper  to  say 
a  few  words  as  to  the  relation  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
to  the  further  history,  and  also  concerning  the 
general  character  of  its  christology.  Although 
Justin  Martyr  himself  makes  no  use  of  this  gospel 
in  connection  with  his  Logos  doctrine,  it  begins  to 
be  quoted  by  his  immediate  successors,  and  soon 
becomes  the  great  repository  of  proof  texts  for  the 
whole  Logos  school.  It  is  pertinent,  therefore,  to 
note  that  its  christology  is  essentially  Pauline, 
with  the  addition  of  the  Logos  terminology.  Its 
monotheism  is  decided.  God  is  always  the  Father. 
Christ  is  the  mediator  sent  of  God,  subordinate 
and  dependent.     Its  doctrine  is  summed  up  in  the 


ATHANASIANISM  33 

words  of  Clirist's  prayer,  "  This  is  life  eternal,  to 
know  thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ 
whom  thou  hast  sent."  In  a  single  point,  how- 
ever, the  Johannine  christology  advances  beyond 
the  Pauline.  Paul  has  a  transcendental  view  of 
Christ  as  the  "  form "  and  "  image "  of  God. 
But  the  fourth  Gospel  develops  a  metaphysical 
unity  between  the  Father  and  the  Son  to  which 
Paul  is  a  stranger.  Just  how  much  is  involved  in 
the  famous  passage,  "  I  and  my  Father  are  one,"  is 
somewhat  doubtful.  It  is  clear,  however,  that  the 
unity  asserted  is  not  one  of  substance  or  being, 
since  Christ  compares  it  to  the  unity  of  believers : 
"  that  they  all  may  be  one  even  as  we  are  one." 

There  is  a  general  resemblance  between  the 
Logos  doctrine  of  the  fourth  Gospel  and  that  of 
Justin  Martyr.  Yet  there  are  striking  divergences 
which  indicate  an  independent  origin.  The  fourth 
Gospel  is  mystical,  with  a  spice  of  Neo-Platonism, 
reminding  one  of  Philo.  Justin  is  speculative, 
with  an  emanation  element  which  has  a  Stoic 
strain.  His  distinction  between  the  immanent 
and  the  personalized  Logos  is  wanting  in  the  fourth 
Gospel.  Behind  both  is  the  shadow  of  Gnosticism. 
But  the  fourth  Gospel  gives  the  clearest  signs  of 
Gnostic  influence.  Its  peculiar  vocabulary  is  from 
Gnostic  sources.  The  Gnostic  dualism  is  also 
suggested  in  the  shaping  given  to  the  doctrine  of 
Satan,  and  in  the  two  classes  of  men,  children  of 
light,  who  are  sons  of  God,  and  children  of  dark- 
ness, who  are  of  their  "father  the  devil."     The 


34  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

real  authorship  of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  obscure. 
It  may  be  that  there  is  behind  it  a  true  Johannine 
tradition  ;  but  philosophically  it  plainly  belongs 
to  the  Philonic  school.  It  is  no  valid  objection 
that  Philo  has  no  incarnation.  The  object  of  the 
gospel,  in  part  at  least,  was,  in  a  Gnostic  way,  to 
identify  the  Jesus  of  history  with  the  mediation 
Logos  of  Greek  philosophy.  This  required  that 
the  Logos  should  be  made  flesh.  It  seems  prob- 
able that  the  Logos  doctrine  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
and  that  of  Justin  Martyr  represent  two  separate 
streams  of  philosophical  Christian  thought,  which 
afterwards  became  united  in  a  common  evolution. 
We  come  to  Origen,  the  boldest  speculator  and 
the  most  fertile  thinker  of  the  ancient  church. 
The  school  which  he  founded  included  all  the 
lights  of  later  Greek  orthodoxy.  Even  Athana- 
sius,  who  called  no  man  master,  sought  the  aid  of 
his  great  name,  and  quoted  him  to  show  that  he 
was  a  true  homoousian.  Origen  stamped  on  Greek 
theology  the  essential  features  that  it  has  borne 
ever  since.  In  his  hands  the  Logos  doctrine  suf- 
fered two  amendments.  The  first  is  his  view  of 
the  eternal  generation  of  the  Son.  The  distinc- 
tion of  the  Justin  Martyr  school  between  immanent 
and  personalized  Logos  Origen  discarded.  He 
taught  that  the  Son  was  eternally  a  distinct  per- 
sonal being.  Holding  to  his  real  generation  from 
the  Father,  he  insisted  that  it  was  without  begin- 
ning, since  the  Father's  activity  was  unchangeable 
and  eternal.     This  view  placed  the  Logos  doctrine 


ATHANASIANISM  35 

on  a  firmer  metaphysical  basis,  since  it  removed 
the  Son  of  God  more  completely  from  the  category 
of  created  beings,  and  also  opposed  all  theories  of 
a  temporal  evolution  such  as  were  proposed  by  the 
Sabellians.  The  Origenistic  doctrine  of  eternal 
generation  has  recently  been  treated  with  consider- 
able contempt,  but  it  took  a  firm  hold  on  the 
Greek  mind  and  became  the  fundamental  note  of 
the  Greek  Trinitarianism.  It  has  been  said  that 
the  Nicene  creed  does  not  teach  it.  This  cannot 
be  sustained.  It  is  certainly  implied  there.  In 
fact,  the  whole  homoousian  doctrine  is  built  upon 
it,  and  Athanasius,  the  great  expounder  of  the  doc- 
trine, clearly  holds  it. 

The  second  amendment  of  Origen  was  in  the 
line  of  the  strict  subordination  of  the  Son  to  the 
Father.  He  not  only  emphasized  this  point  as 
essential  to  the  defense  of  the  trinitarian  doctrine 
against  the  charge  of  tritheism,  but  he  also  gave 
it  an  entirely  new  theological  aspect  by  insisting 
on  the  difference  of  essence,  Justin  Martyr  made 
the  Son  to  be  an  emanation  or  product  of  the 
Father's  essence.  Origen  opposed  all  emanation 
theories,  substituting  the  doctrine  of  eternal  gen- 
eration. Hence  he  denied  that  the  Son  was  of 
the  same  essence  with  the  Father,  although  he  at 
the  same  time  denied  that  he  was  of  any  created 
essence.  The  Son  was  truly  begotten  of  the 
Father,  but  his  nature  was  different,  since  he 
lacked  the  attributes  of  absoluteness  and  self- 
existence,  and  derived  his  being  from  the  Father's 


36  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

will.  Thus  Origen  reduced  the  Son  to  a  sort  of 
middle  being  between  the  uncreated  and  the 
created,  and  paved  the  way  for  Arius. 

Arius  has  become  the  arch-heretic  of  church 
history ;  but  in  the  interest  of  historical  truth  I 
wish  to  say  that  great  injustice  has  been  done 
him.  He  was  a  sincere  and  thorough  Trinitarian 
after  the  type  of  his  age,  and  sought  to  defend  the 
trinitarian  doctrine  against  all  taint  of  SabeUian- 
ism.  But  his  polemic  led  him  to  take  a  step 
further  in  the  direction  toward  which  Origen  had 
pointed,  and  which  had  already  been  anticipated 
by  such  Origenists  as  Dionysius  of  Alexandria 
and  Eusebius  of  Caesarea,  —  that  the  Son  of  God, 
if  truly  derived  from  the  Father  and  by  his  wiU, 
must  be  a  creature^  though  the  highest  creature 
in  the  universe,  and  the  creator  himself,  as  the 
Logos  or  mediation  principle,  of  all  other  creatures. 

We  are  thus  brought  to  the  great  crisis  in  the 
development  of  the  Greek  theology,  and  to  its 
fourth  stage,  —  the  epoch  of  Athanasius  and  the 
Nicene  creed.  Historically  and  critically,  Athana- 
sianism  is  simply  a  revolt  from  the  subordination 
tendency,  when  carried  too  far,  and  a  counter- 
reaction  along  the  Origenistic  lines  of  eternal 
generation  and  of  an  essential  difference  between 
the  Son  of  God  and  all  created  beings.  But,  as  is 
usual  in  such  reactions,  it  went  to  the  opposite 
extreme.  Arius  had  stretched  subordination  to  its 
farthest  point,  Athanasius  reduced  it  to  a  mini- 
mum.    Origen  had  described  the  Son  as  "  a  mid- 


ATHANASIANISM  37 

die  being  between  the  uncreated  and  the  created." 
The  Nicene  creed  declared  him  to  be  of  the  same 
essence  with  the  Father,  since  he  is  true  Son  of 
God,  and  as  a  Son  must  be  of  the  Father's  nature, 
—  "  God  of  God,  very  God  of  very  God."  Thus 
the  term  homoousios  becomes  the  turning-point 
of  the  Nicene  epoch.  Yet  curiously  this  famous 
word  made  much  less  noise  in  the  Athanasian  age 
than  it  has  since,  and,  besides,  a  new  meaning  has 
been  foisted  upon  it  which  has  no  ground  in  the 
word  itself  or  in  the  use  made  of  it  by  the  Nicene 
theologians.  It  was  put  into  the  Nicene  creed 
by  a  sort  of  accident,  as  Athanasius  explains,  in 
order  to  drive  the  Arians  from  their  cover ;  and 
although  it  became  in  this  way  a  watchword  of 
orthodoxy,  it  was  not  insisted  on  as  essential  even 
by  Athanasius  himseK.  What  it  meant  to  the 
Nicene  party  is  clear  from  Athanasius'  own  expla- 
nations. He  declares  distinctly  that  it  was  used 
simply  to  signify  that  the  Son  was  truly  Son,  not 
putatively  or  adoptively,  and  that,  as  true  Son,  he 
was  of  the  same  generic  nature  with  the  Father, 
and  so  equal  to  the  Father  in  all  divine  attributes, 
Athanasius  was  ready  even  to  accept  the  terna 
homoiousios  (like  in  essence)  as  a  synonym  for 
homoousios  (completely  like  in  essence),  if  it  was 
explained  to  mean  a  likeness  of  essence  in  kind 
which  would  aUow  that  the  Son  was  a  true  Son 
and  derived  from  the  Father  his  essential  qualities. 
This,  in  fact,  became  the  basis  of  the  union  which 
followed  between  the  Athanasian  and  Semi-Arian 


38  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

parties,  resulting  in  the  acceptance  of  tlie  Nicene 
creed  by  all  except  the  extreme  Arians.  It  is  a 
fact  which  seems  not  to  be  generally  recognized, 
that  Athanasius  uses  the  word  homoousios  very 
rarely,  while  he  employs  the  word  homoios  (like) 
very  frequently,  as  expressing  his  own  position 
concerning  the  relation  of  the  Son  to  the  Father. 
It  is  significant  that  in  the  "  Statement  of  Faith  " 
which  was  written  not  long  after  the  formation  of 
the  Nicene  creed,  he  uses  simply  the  word  homoios, 
"  being  like  the  Father,  as  the  Lord  says  :  '  He 
that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the  Father.' "  What 
Athanasius  contended  for  so  stoutly  against  the 
Arians  was  the  real  divine  sonship  of  Christ,  and 
his  essential  equality-  with  the  leather.  When 
this  was  allowed,  he  cared  little  for  words. 

We  are  now  prepared  to  estimate  more  clearly 
and  comprehensively  the  trinitarianism  of  Athana^ 
sius.  Radically  it  is  Origenism.  The  Logos  doc- 
trine, in  its  Origenistic  form  of  eternal  generation 
and  derived  subordination,  forms  the  backbone  of 
the  Nicene  christology.  Too  much  theological 
significance  has  been  given  by  historical  writers  to 
the  Nicene  epoch,  as  if  it  created  an  essentially 
new  theology.  This  is  very  far  from  the  truth. 
It  was  a  time  of  widespread  ecclesiastical  ferment, 
and  men  of  action,  rather  than  of  speculative 
thought,  came  to  the  front.  A  conflict  arose  be- 
tween two  factions  of  the  same  theological  school. 
Origenism  became  divided  against  itself.  Athana- 
sius was  not  a  speculative,  systematic  thinker ;  he 


ATHANASIANISM  30 

was  a  born  leader  of  men,  a  knight  of  Christian 
chivalry,  ready  to  point  his  lance  at  every  denier 
of  "  the  faith  once  delivered."  He  seized  the 
word  homoousios  and  threw  it  as  a  gauntlet  into 
the  arena,  but  it  was  a  word  of  battle  to  be 
dropped  at  leisure,  not  a  note  of  new  theology.  It 
was  in  the  Latin  West  that  a  makeshift  catch- 
word of  the  Nicene  nomenclature  was  taken  up, 
its  true  meaning  misunderstood,  and  a  new  scheme 
of  trinitarian  theology  drawn  from  it.  The  differ- 
ence between  Athanasius  and  Origen  is  largely  a 
matter  of  words.  Origen  disliked  the  term  homo- 
ousios because  it  seemed  to  break  down  subordina- 
tion and  introduce  tritheism.  Athanasius  adopted 
it  because  it  seemed  to  save  subordination  from 
the  annihilating  heterousianism  (unlikeness  of 
essence)  of  Arius.  Both  were  defending  the  same 
position,  but  from  different  standpoints.  Yet 
Athanasius  took  one  long  step  forward.  He  held 
to  a  certain  subordination  of  the  Son  to  the  Father, 
as  he  was  compelled  to,  in  consistency  with  the 
essential  character  of  the  Logos  mediating  doc- 
trine, to  which  he  unflinchingly  adhered.  But  he 
reduced  it,  as  we  have  already  said,  to  its  lowest 
possible  terms.  He  was  ready  to  call  Christ  God, 
not  merely  in  the  larger  sense  of  what  is  superhu- 
man or  divine,  but  in  the  strict  meaning,  "  very 
God  of  very  God,"  as  having  the  same  essential 
nature  with  the  Father.  He  even  declared  the 
Son  to  be  "  equal "  to  the  Father,  applied  to  him 
the  terms  which  characterize  the  highest  deity,  and 


40  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

gave  him  the  supreme  attributes  of  omniscience, 
omnipotence,  and  sovereignty.  This  is  new  theo- 
logical language,  and  seems  to  indicate  an  entirely- 
new  departure.  But  a  close  study  of  Athanasius 
makes  it  clear  that  he  has  not  departed  from  the 
Origenistic  principles  of  generation  and  subordina- 
tion. In  fact,  he  could  not  do  so  without  surren- 
dering the  whole  Logos  doctrine  in  its  original 
form,  and  exposing  himself  to  the  charge  of  hold- 
ing to  three  independent  Gods.  If  he  had  felt  a 
leaning  toward  the  entire  elimination  of  the  subor- 
dination element,  of  which  there  is  no  evidence,  the 
danger  of  such  a  charge  would  have  deterred  him. 
The  one  object  of  dread  ever  present  to  the  Nicene 
and  post-Nicene  Fathers  was  the  spectre  of  Trithe- 
ism.  To  he  squarely  Trinitarian  and  yet  not  he 
Tritheistic  was  the  great  effort  of  Greek  theology. 
How  was  it  accomplished?  The  answer  to  this 
question  gives  us  the  "  open  sesame  "  of  the  Atha- 
nasian  Trinitarianism.  Three  distinct  points  are  to 
be  noted,  —  the  view  taken  of  the  Father  ;  of  the 
Son ;  and  of  their  metaphysical  relation  to  each 
other. 

First,  the  Father,  with  Athanasius,  is  the  one 
God,  the  Absolute  and  Supreme  Being.  He  never 
confounds  the  one  God  with  the  Trinity.  The 
three  Persons  are  not  one  Being.  This,  to  him, 
is  Sabellianism.  His  monotheism  is  clearly  set 
forth  in  his  "  Statement  of  Faith  :  "  "  We  believe 
in  one  Unbegotten  God,  Father  Almighty,  maker 
of  all  things  visible  and  invisible,  that  hath  his 


ATHANASIANISM  41 

being  from  himself,  and  in  one  only-begotten  Word, 
Wisdom,  Son,  begotten  of  the  Father  without 
beginning  and  eternally."  Unbegottenness  and 
self-existence  are  here  made  the  essential  attributes 
of  the  Father  alone.  He  is  the  eternal  cause  and 
fountain  of  all  being,  including  even  the  being  of 
the  Son  and  Holy  Spirit.  This  point  is  funda- 
mental in  the  Athanasian  system  ;  it  is  the  philo- 
sophical Platonic  assumption  with  which  he  starts, 
and  on  which  he  builds  his  Logos  doctrine.  It  is 
the  stronghold  of  his  theism  against  all  pantheism 
on  the  one  hand,  and  of  his  monotheism  against 
all  polytheism  or  tritheism  on  the  other.  No 
Greek  theologian  held  more  firmly  to  the  divine 
transcendence  than  Athanasius.  He  had  no  con- 
troversy with  Arius  here.  He  held  equally  with 
him  that  God  was  utterly  unlike  his  creation,  and 
was  separated  from  it,  in  his  essence,  by  infinite 
measures.  Hence  the  prominence  given  by  him  to 
the  Logos  doctrine,  which  is  central  and  dominant 
in  his  whole  christology.  With  Athanasius  the 
Logos  in  his  mediation  role  is  essential  to  the 
existence  of  the  universe  as  well  as  to  the  redemp- 
tion of  mankind.  In  him  the  cosmological  idea 
triumphs  over  the  soteriological.  Christ  is  much 
more  than  the  Saviour  of  men ;  he  is  the  eternal 
and  necessary  principle  of  mediation  and  com- 
munion between  the  transcendent  God  and  all 
created  things.  Thus  the  incarnation  rather  than 
the  crucifixion  is  made  the  prominent  fact  in  the 
relation  of  Christ  to  men.     It  is  not  sin  merely, 


42  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

but  nature  as  created,  that  separates  man  from 
God.  Athanasius  here  departs  from  the  Scripture,  i 
which  teaches  man's  essential  likeness  to  God,  and 
also  from  Plato,  who  declares  that  "likeness  to 
God"  (6/Aot(i)orts  Tw  ^€(p)  is  man's  great  prerogative 
and  moral  duty.  Plato's  doctrine  of  transcendence 
was  modified  by  his  view  of  man's  moral  relation- 
ship. Athanasius  tended  rather  to  emphasize  the 
divine  transcendence  and  to  separate  man  from 
God  more  completely.  Hence,  according  to  him, 
the  absolute  necessity  of  the  incarnation.  "The 
Word  was  made  man  that  we  might  be  divinized  " 
(OeoTTOL-qOdiiiv),  And  here  appears  the  great  rea- 
son why  Athanasius  insisted  so  earnestly  upon  the 
homoousian  doctrine.  In  his  view,  unless  the  Logos 
mediator  was  essentially  divine,  "  very  God  of  very 
God,"  the  chasm  between  God  and  man,  between 
the  infinite  and  the  finite,  could  not  be  spanned. 
But  let  it  be  noted  that  this  whole  view  involves 
the  strictest  monotheism.  The  Logos  mediating 
principle  is  as  sharply  distinguished  from  the 
Absolute  God  as  he  is  from  the  creation  in  whose 
behalf  he  mediates. 

Secondly,  Athanasius'  doctrine  of  the  Son  is 
the  logical  resultant  of  his  doctrine  of  the  Absolute 
•God  as  Father  and  of  the  mediating  Logos.  How 
does  the  Logos  become  endowed  with  his  mediat- 
ing function  ?  It  is  by  virtue  of  his  Sonship. 
The  Logos  of  God  is  the  Son  of  God,  and  hence 
able  to  reveal  him.  Here  Athanasius  is  a  true 
Origenist.     Sonship  is  not  a  superficial  and  tem- 


ATHANASIANISM  43 

poral  movement  of  the  divine  activity;  it  is  an 
eternal  relationship.  Athanasius,  moreover,  holds 
equally  with  Origen  to  the  reality  and  genuine- 
ness of  the  sonship.  He  does  not  explain  it  away 
as  mere  metaphor.  The  real  sonship  is  what 
he  means  by  homoousios.  This  sonship  is  what 
separates  Christ  from  the  category  of  creatures 
and  makes  him  truly  divine.  But  real  sonship 
involves  a  real  generation.  This,  too,  Athanasius 
accepts  in  all  its  literalness,  though  he  guards 
against  a  materialistic  view  of  it.  In  one  point 
only  does  he  vary  from  Origen,  —  in  making  the 
generation  an  eternal  fact  or  condition  of  the 
divine  nature,  rather  than  a  voluntary  movement 
of  the  divine  will.  Thus  the  ground  is  laid  for 
the  subordination  of  the  Son  to  the  Father.  The 
Son  is  a  generated,  that  is,  a  derived  being.  Con- 
sequently he  is  not  self-existent  or  independent. 
This  is  distinctly  declared  in  one  remarkable  pas- 
sage (fourth  Oration,  3),  where  Athanasius  argues 
that  if  the  Logos  were  self-existent  (d<^'  iavrov  vn-i- 
arry)  there  would  result  two  independent  causes 
of  existence  or  supreme  Beings  (^vo  di/ctev  dpxaO* 
The  subordination  thus  involved  is  not  a  mere 
official  one.  The  whole  theory  of  official  subor- 
dination is  a  product  of  Western  thought;  it  is 
unknown  in  Greek  theology.  Subordination  with 
Athanasius  is  of  nature,  for  the  Son  derives  his 
existence  "  from  the  Father's  essence."  It  is  true 
that  he  insists  upon  the  equality  of  the  Son  with 
the  Father.     Yet  the  term  "  equal "  was  used  by 


44  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

him  in  a  relative,  not  absolute  sense.  It  applied 
to  those  attributes  with  which  Christ  was  endowed 
by  virtue  of  his  generation  from  the  Father,  but 
not  to  those  which  make  the  Father  the  supreme 
God. 

Thirdly,  what,  then,  is  the  metaphysical  relation 
of  the  Father  and  Son  ?  At  the  outset  let  it  be 
noted  that  Athanasius  has  no  leaning  toward 
Sabellianism.  No  stronger  protests  against  the 
Sabellian  position  can  be  found  than  in  his  writ- 
ings. He  sharply  opposes  the  doctrine  of  one 
personal  Being  in  three  modes  of  revelation  and 
activity.  On  this  point  Athanasius  is  as  thor- 
oughly trinitarian  as  Origen,  and  he  stands 
squarely  in  the  line  of  all  orthodox  Greek  theolo- 
gians. He  has  been  accused  of  sympathizing  with 
Marcellus,  who  was  a  strong  defender  of  the 
Nicene  creed,  but  lapsed  into  a  complete  Sabellian 
doctrine.  There  is  no  ground  for  the  charge. 
Marcellus  was  separated  from  Athanasius  in  his 
whole  metaphysics.  He  was  not  an  Origenist ;  he 
declared  Origen  to  be  the  source  of  the  whole 
Arian  heresy.  He  opposed  the  Origenistic  doc- 
trine of  generation  and  subordination,  and  held 
to  the  absoluteness  of  the  Logos.  When  Athana- 
sius came  to  understand  the  real  position  of  Mar- 
cellus he  disowned  him,  and  his  earnest  plea 
against  the  SabeUian  doctrine  in  the  fourth  Ora- 
tion seems  to  have  been  directed  especially  against 
MarceUus  himself,  though  his  name  is  not  men- 
tioned.    The  truth  is  that  Marcellus  held  a  type 


ATHANASIANISM  45 

of  doctrine  that  was  gaining  ground  in  the  West, 
and  his  chief  sympathizers  were  in  that  quarter. 
Sabellianism  had  its  origin  on  Greek  soil,  but  it 
was  wholly  rejected  by  the  Origenistic  Logos 
school,  which  finally  triumphed  overall  monarchian 
tendencies  and  remained  tenaciously  trinitarian 
to  the  last ;  while  the  Sabellianism  of  Marcellus 
reappeared  in  a  disguised  form  in  the  Western 
Latin  church  in  the  person  of  Augustine. 

Athanasius,  then,  held  to  a  trinity  of  three 
personal  Beings.  On  this  point  there  was  no  dis- 
agreement between  him  and  Arius.  Both  stood 
on  common  Origenistic  ground;  both  equally  op- 
posed Sabellianism.  Their  differences  arose  on 
the  question  of  the  nature  of  the  second  person. 
Arius  declared  him  to  be  a  creature ;  Athanasius 
declared  him  to  be  the  true  Son  of  God,  of  the 
same  generic  nature  with  the  Father  (o/xoovo-tos), 
and  therefore  not  a  creature. 

That  Athanasius  did  not  mean  by  homoousios 
one  numerical  essence  or  being  is  not  only  involved 
in  his  whole  metaphysics,  but  is  expressly  declared 
in  his  "  Statement  of  Faith :  "  "  We  do  not  hold 
a  Son-Father,  as  do  the  Sabellians,  calling  Him 
single  in  essence  but  not  the  same  in  essence 
(^fj.ovoov(nov  KOL  ovx  ofjLoova-Lov^,  and  thus  destroying 
the  existence  of  the  Son."  The  charge  here  is 
that  the  Sabellians  reduce  the  Father  and  Son  to 
mere  modes  of  one  being,  —  a  sort  of  Son-Father, 
and  thus  destroy  the  Son's  distinct  personal  exist- 
ence.    Athanasius  could   not  have  distinguished 


46  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

numerical  unity  of  essence  from  generic  unity  more 
pointedly  than  lie  did  by  the  terms  monoousios 
and  homoousios.  He  held  that  the  Father  and 
the  Son  were  both  divine  beings,  and  hence  of  the 
same  divine  nature  (o/xoovo-tot)  ;  but  this  is  a  very 
different  doctrine  from  the  Sabellian,  which  makes 
God  a  single  essence  (/x-oi/oovo-tos),  revealing  him- 
self in  three  personal  forms.  Sabellianism  is  es- 
sentially monistic  and  pantheistic ;  it  confounds 
the  persons  and  their  acts,  reducing  them  to  acci- 
dents of  one  substance.  Athanasius  was  a  theist. 
He  held  that  God  is  a  self-conscious,  individual, 
uni-personal  Being.  He  was  equally  a  monotheist. 
He  believed  in  "  one  God,  the  Father  Almighty." 
Hence  he  was  always  careful  to  distinguish  the 
acts  of  the  Father  and  the  Son  as  well  as  their 
.individualities. 

Modern  writers  frequently  assume  that  the 
Greek  Fathers  had  crude  ideas  of  what  personality 
is,  —  a  curious  assumption  to  make  in  regard  to 
men  who  were  profoundly  versed  in  the  Aristotelian 
psychology,  and  whose  metaphysical  discrimina- 
tions have  formed  the  warp  and  woof  of  theological 
thought  to  the  present  day.  I  grant,  however, 
that  modern  theologians  have  made  one  psycholo- 
gical discovery  which  was  unknown  to  Athanasius. 
He  had  not  learned  that  "  person,"  as  a  metaphy- 
sical term,  may  have  two  meanings,  a  natural  and 
a  non-natural.  By  it  he  meant  an  individual 
being,  or  what  Mr.  Joseph  Cook  caUs  derisively  a 
person  "in  the  ordinary  Boston  sense."     It  was 


ATHANASIANISM  47 

reserved  for  Augustine  and  his  successors  down 
to  Mr.  Cook  to  confound  all  valid  laws  of  thought 
by  asserting  that  "  person  "  may  mean  one  thing 
in  common  speech  and  a  very  different  thing  in 
Christian  theology. 

But  if  Athanasius  held  to  three  persons  in  the 
strict  sense,  how  did  he  save  himself  from  trithe- 
ism  ?  I  answer :  In  the  same  way  as  his  prede- 
cessors had  done  before  him,  by  the  doctrine  of 
one  supreme  cause.  Here  again  Athanasius  is  a 
pure  Origenist.  The  Origenistic  doctrine  of  gen- 
eration and  subordination  solved  for  him,  as  for 
all  the  Greek  Fathers,  the  mystery  of  the  divine 
imity  as  related  to  the  divine  trinity.  The  Son  as 
begotten  of  the  Father  is  a  derived  being,  and  so 
cannot  be  a  separate  or  foreign  deity.  This  is 
the  point  of  the  varied  illustrations  which  Atha- 
nasius employs  in  setting  forth  his  view,  such  as 
fountain  and  stream,  sun  and  ray,  king  and  image, 
parent  and  child.  Some  of  these  comparisons  are 
capable  of  a  Sabellian  sense,  if  the  object  of  Atha- 
nasius in  using  them  is  not  imderstood ;  and  in 
recent  theology  they  have  been  thus  misinter- 
preted. But  they  were  intended  to  illustrate  the 
conamunity  of  nature  of  the  Father  and  the  Son, 
not  numerical  oneness.  This  is  evident  from  those 
illustrations  which  cannot  admit  any  such  con- 
struction. Take  the  case  of  parent  and  child 
which  Athanasius  uses  so  frequently.  Since  the 
child  is  the  offspring  of  the  parent  he  is  of  the 
same  generic  nature  (o/xoovo-tos)  ;  as  such,  he  is  not 


48  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

foreign  or  exterior  to  the  parent,  but  interior  and 
proper  to  him,  and  so  vice  versa  the  parent  is  in- 
terior to  the  child.  Athanasius  represents  a  fa- 
ther (first  Oration,  26)  as  replying  to  the  question 
whence  his  child  came :  "  He  is  not  from  without, 
but  from  myself,  proper  and  similar  to  my  essence, 
not  become  mine  from  another,  but  begotten  of 
me;  wherefore  I  too  am  wholly  in  him,  while  I 
remain  myself  what  I  am^  So,  he  adds,  the  Son 
is  interior  and  proper  to  the  Father.  This  doc- 
trine of  the  interiorness  or  coinherence  of  the  Son 
in  the  Father  has  been  misapprehended  by  Augus- 
tinian  theologians.  It  has  been  supposed  to  support 
strongly  the  view  of  numerical  unity.  But  this 
was  not  the  question  at  issue.  Athanasius  was 
arguing  against  the  Arian  doctrine  that  the  Son 
is  a  creature,  and  the  illustration  of  parent  and 
child  was  applied  directly  against  his  Arian  oppo- 
nents :  "  Let  them  confess  in  like  manner  concern- 
ing the  Word  of  God  that  he  is  simply  from  the 
Father."  The  argument  assumes  the  fundamental 
postulate  of  the  Platonic  dualism  and  transcend- 
ence,—  that  the  created  is  exterior  and  foreign 
to  the  uncreated.  If  the  Son  is  a  creature,  he  is 
foreign  to  the  Father,  Hke  all  other  creatures ;  but 
if  he  is  a  true  Son,  of  the  Father's  essence,  he 
cannot  be  foreign  or  exterior,  and  hence  cannot  be 
a  creature.  As  a  child  is  generically  in  his  parent 
and  the  parent  in  the  child,  so  the  Son  is  in  the 
Father  and  the  Father  in  the  Son ;  and  it  is  to 
support  this  argument  that  Athanasius  appeals  so 


ATHANASIANISM  49 

frequently  to  Christ's  words :  "  That  ye  may  know 
that  I  am  in  the  Father  and  the  Father  in  me." 
"  I  and  my  Father  are  one."  "  He  that  hath  seen 
me  hath  seen  the  Father." 

In  this  connection  further  light  is  shed  upon  the 
meaning  of  the  term  homoousios,  as  used  by  Atha- 
nasius.  He  applies  it  continually  to  human  per- 
sons, as  belonging  to  one  human  race,  that  is,  in  a 
generic  sense.  How  then  can  it  be  assumed  that, 
in  applying  it  to  the  Son  of  God,  he  uses  it  in  a 
totally  different  sense,  especially  when  the  divine 
relationship  is  being  directly  compared  with  the 
human,  and  no  hint  is  given  that  the  meaning  is 
changed?  But  we  are  not  left  to  conjecture. 
Athanasius  himself  explains  his  meaning  in  one 
clear  passage,  not  to  speak  of  others :  "  The  sense 
of  '  offspring '  and  '  coessential '  (^ofioovo-iosi)  is  one, 
and  whoso  considers  the  Son  an  offspring,  rightly 
considers  him  also  as  coessential."  ^  If  this  pas- 
sage by  itseK  were  of  doubtful  interpretation,  the 
context  sets  all  doubt  at  rest,  for  Athanasius  is 
showing  that  the  Semi-Arian  doctrine  of  "  likeness 
in  essence "  (o/xotovo-tos)  is  not  in  necessary  disa- 
gi'eement  with  the  homoousian  doctrine,  since  it 
allows  that  the  Son  is  the  true  offspring  of  the 
Father.  But  it  is  impossible  to  interpret  "  like- 
ness in  essence  "  as  implying  numerical  unity.  It 
would  seem  unnecessary  to  pursue  this  point 
further;  but  so  ingrained  in  modern  theology  is 
the  view  that  the  Nicene  Athanasian  doctrine  of 
1  De  SynodiSf  42. 


50         EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIAISTISM 

the  Trinity  involves  a  numerical  unity  of  essence, 
that  I  propose  a  few  additional  considerations. 

First,  if  Athanasius  had  meant  by  homoousios 
"  numerically  one  in  essence,"  he  would  not  have 
distinguished  it,  as  he  did,  from  fiovoovmos  and 
ravroovo-tos,  for  this  is  the  very  point  of  the  differ- 
ence in  these  terms,  as  Athanasius  himself  shows, 
defining  homoousios  as  meaning  "  sameness  in  lihe- 
ness,^^  in  contrast  with  a  simple  unity.  Further, 
the  fact  that  Athanasius  made  such  common  use 
of  the  term  o/zoto?  (like)  as  expressing  his  own 
faith,  and  that  he  was  ready  to  accept  o/iotovo-tos  as 
a  synonym  for  oftoovo-tos,  if  properly  explained, 
seems  whoUy  conclusive.  But,  stiU  further,  such 
a  use  of  the  word  would  have  been  altogether  new 
in  its  history.  Everywhere  in  Greek  literature 
homoousios  means  generic  likeness  or  sameness. 
Aristotle  caUs  the  stars  oixoovo-lol.  Plotinus  uses 
the  same  term  for  souls,  when  arguing  that  they 
are  divine  and  immortal.  There  is  no  evidence 
that  any  Greek  Father  ever  gave  the  word  any 
different  meaning.  Gregory  of  Nyssa  calls  not 
only  "  human  souls,"  but  also  "  corruptible  bodies," 
homoousia  {o^oovo'ia  rot  ^OapTo.  crc^jxaTa).  Chrysos- 
tom  describes  Eve  as  homoousios  with  Adam.^ 

There  is  one  more  consideration  that  goes  to 
the  root  of  the  whole  matter.  The  assumption 
of  numerical  unity  of  essence  involves  another 
assumption,  viz.,  that,  in  the  case  of  the  Trinity, 

^  Gregory,  Contra  Eunomium,  vii.  5 ;  Chrysostom,  Hontil.  in 
Genes,  xvi. 


ATHANASIANISM  61 

singleness  o£  essence  exists  with  a  plurality  of  per- 
sons. But  this  breaks  down  a  fundamental  law  of 
logic  and  psychology.  Essence  is  the  sum  of  the 
qualities  of  a  being.  Person  is  a  being  with  certain 
qualities  which  constitute  its  essence.  Essence 
and  person  then  must  be  coincident.  They  cannot 
be  separated.  The  distinction  between  them  is 
purely  logical  and  subjective.  To  assume  a  separ 
ration  in  fact,  or  that  one  may  be  singular  and  the 
other  plural,  is  to  confound  the  subjective  with  the 
objective,  and  create  a  metaphysical  contradiction.^ 
The  Greek  Fathers  were  never  guilty  of  such  a 
confusion.  They  were  too  well  versed  in  the 
Aristotelian  logic.  The  question  was  never  even 
raised  until  the  fifth  century,  in  the  compromise 
of  Chalcedon.  All  through  the  earlier  trinitarian 
and  christological  controversies  the  coincidence  of 
nature  and  person  was  accepted  on  all  sides  as 
axiomatic.  On  this  ground  Origen  and  his  school 
called  the  three  persons  three  essences,  meaning 
that  each  person  has  his  own  individual  qualities. 
So  Theodore  of  Mopsuestia,  a  devoted  adherent  of 
the  Nicene  creed,  was  led  to  his  theory  of  two  per- 
sons in  Christ,  or  of  two  real  Christs,  by  assuming 
that  if  there  were  two  complete   natures,  divine 

^  While  I  must  dissent  entirely  from  the  interpretation  of 
Principal  Robertson  and  Cardinal  Newman  in  vol.  iv.  of  the 
Nicene  Fathers^  I  wish  to  express  my  admiration  of  the  candor  of 
both  these  critics  in  allowing  that  their  view  involves  what  is 
self-contradictory  to  the  human  understanding.  But  does  not 
such  an  admission  stamp  the  interpretation  itself  as  false  ?  Cer- 
tainly Athanasius  was  not  conscious  of  holding  a  self -contradic- 
tory doctrine,  and  he  was  a  keen  logician. 


52  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

and  human,  two  persons  must  result.  The  same 
assumption  led  the  Monophysites  to  their  theory 
of  "one  nature,"  since  Christ  was  one  person. 
There  is  not  the  slightest  evidence  that  any  Greek 
Father  before  Theodoret  held  any  other  opinion. 
The  Cappadocian  Athanasian  school  stood  firmly 
on  it.  That  Athanasius  himseK  should  have  de- 
veloped a  new  metaphysics  on  this  point,  so  as  to 
change  the  whole  character  of  trinitarian  doctrine, 
without  leaving  a  ripple  on  the  surface  of  ecclesi- 
astical history,  is  inconceivable. 

But  the  fact  may  be  brought  up  that,  while 
Origen  called  three  persons  three  essences,  Atha- 
nasius and  his  followers  refused  to  do  so.  The 
explanation  is  simple.  It  was  the  result  of  a  lin- 
guistic evolution,  such  as  is  common  to  all  language. 
The  theological  terminology  of  the  Greek  Fathers 
was  Aristotelian.  Aristotle  distinguished  two 
kinds  of  essence.  By  "  first  essence  "  he  meant  a 
concrete  being  or  thing.  By  "  second  essence  " 
he  meant  the  "form"  or  idea,  or,  in  Platonic 
language,  the  universal,  the  genus  or  species, 
which  is  the  basis  of  all  "  first  essences  "  or  indi- 
vidual things.  These  distinctions  imderlie  the 
whole  Greek  theology.  But  they  are  brought  out 
explicitly  and  in  Aristotelian  form  by  the  later 
scholastic  Athanasians,  Gregory  of  Nyssa  and  John 
of  Damascus.  When  Origen  called  the  Son  an 
"  essence  "  he  meant  "  first  essence,"  that  is,  a 
concrete  being  or  real  person.  But  when  discus- 
sion arose  in  the  Nicene  period  over  the  question 


ATHANASIANISM  63 

of  the  relation  of  nature  to  person,  and  especially 
concerning  the  use  of  vTroorrao-is  for  person,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  ovoria,  the  term  ovaU  became  re- 
stricted in  meaning  to  the  "  second "  sense  of 
Aristotle,  —  the  universal,  generic,  or  abstract 
sense ;  and  such  was  the  common  meaning  of  it  in 
the  later  Greek  Fathers.  Gregory  of  Nyssa  and 
also  John  of  Damascus  define  ovaria  as  kolvov,  that 
is,  what  is  common  or  generic  in  contrast  with  the 
individual  (vTroo-raorts).  Such  is  the  use  of  it  by 
Athanasius.  Hence  he  again  and  again  employs 
the  Platonic  and  Aristotelian  names  for  the  generic 
or  universal  (ctSo?,  fiopcfirj') ,  as  synonyms  for  ova-ia. 
No  evidence  could  be  clearer.  (According  to  Atha- 
nasius the  divine  essence  or  form  or  idea  is  individ- 
ualized and  personalized  in  the  Father,  Son,  and 
Holy  Spirit,  who  are  thus  united  in  a  metaphysi- 
cal and  transcendental  unity,  and  separated  from 
all  created  beings.^  This  is  distinctly  set  forth  by 
John  of  Damascus :  "  Essence  does  not  exist  by 
itself,  but  is  seen  in  persons."  It  is  true  that 
Athanasius  sometimes  uses  the  term  ^cos  as  a 
synonym  for  ovo-ta,  but  he  often  adds  the  abstract, 
^etorr;?,  in  explanation,  and  the  context  always 
shows  this  to  be  his  meaning.  This  usage  is  ex- 
plained by  Gregory  of  Nyssa  in  the  treatise  *Ek 
Twj/  KOLvCiv  ewotwv,  when  he  says  that  if  the  name 
$€6s  signified  a  person,  three  persons  would  signify 
three  gods,  but  since  it  denotes  ovo-ta,  there  is  one 
Divinity.  It  cannot  be  too  distinctly  declared 
that  the  Greek  theologians  from  Athanasius  on 


54  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

are  philosophically  Platonico-Aristotelians.  With 
them  all,  the  idea  or  universal  has  concrete  exist- 
ence only  in  individual  beings.  The  Father,  Son, 
and  Holy  Spirit  are  such  individuals  (vTroo-rao-cts). 
The  unity  of  the  three  is  not  concrete  or  numer- 
ical but  metaphysical  or  generic.  It  is  easy  now 
to  see  why  Athanasius  declined  to  say  "three 
essences,"  and  yet  did  not  hesitate  to  say  "  three 
hypostases  "  or  beings.  The  failure  to  recognize 
this  linguistic  change  in  the  use  of  "essence," 
after  the  time  of  Origen,  has  perhaps  contributed 
more  than  anything  else  to  the  opinion  that  Atha- 
nasius departed  radically  from  Origen's  view.  But 
it  was  in  fact  a  mere  change  of  terminology,  not 
one  of  theological  position.^ 

1  The  translator  of  the  new  volume  of  the  Nicene  Fathers 
(Gregory  of  Nyssa)  represents  Athanasius  as  "  using-  the  older 
terminology,"  not  distinguishing  virSaraffi^  fronx  ovaia  (p.  24). 
In  support  of  his  assertion  he  refers  to  a  passage  in  Ad  Afros,  4. 
But  in  translating  it  he  makes  a  curious  blunder,  leaving'  out  of 
account  or  misinterpreting  the  last  clause,  and  thus  changing  the 
■whole  meaning.  A  reference  to  the  correct  translation  in  the 
fourth  volume  of  the  Nicene  Fathers  would  have  set  him  right. 
In  fact  Athanasius  did  not,  in  this  passage  or  in  the  context, 
raise  the  question  at  all  whether  vv6ara<ris  may  be  used  in  a  dif- 
ferent sense  from  ovaia.  It  was  wholly  out  of  his  thought. 
That  Athanasius  did  elsewhere  use  Tpe?!  vvoffTdtreis  in  contradis- 
tinction to  fiia  ohala  is  allowed  by  the  translator  in  a  note. 

I  must  make  another  criticism  on  the  whole  translation  of 
Gregory's  Contra  Eunomium.  Ovaia  is  translated  everywhere  by 
the  term  "  being "  or  "  Being,"  as  if  it  were  concrete,  while 
vv6araai5  is  translated  always  by  the  term  "person,"  as  if  per- 
son was  to  be  distinguished  from  concrete  being.  This  is  unjust 
both  to  Eunomius  and  to  Gregory.  Eunomius,  as  an  extreme 
Arian,  held  that  the  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit  are  three 
oiiaiaiy  and  that  each  ovaia  is  an  individual  or  personal  being 


ATHANASIANISM  65 

The  Athanasian  Trinitarianism  is  seen  in  its 
completest  form  in  the  Cappadocian  theologians, 
Basil  and  the  two  Gregories.  The  idea  has  re- 
cently been  broached  that  these  men  formed  a 
Neo-Nicene  school,  falling  away  from  the  homoou- 
sianism  of  Athanasius  to  the  older  homoiousianism 
of  Origen.i  This  theory  rests  on  the  assimip- 
tion  that  Athanasius  himself  was  not  an  Origenist. 
But,  as  we  have  seen,  Athanasius  had  no  quarrel 
with  the  genuine  homoiousianism  of  Origen. 
Homoios  was  the  word  oftenest  on  his  own  lips.^ 
His  great  conflict  was  with  the  Arian  Heterou- 

(iJir(J<rTo<ny),  following  tiie  "older  terminology"  of  Origen. 
Gregory,  on  the  contrary,  adopted  the  new  nomenclature,  defining 
ohffia  as  an  ahstract  or  universal  (the  "  second  essence "  of 
Aristotle),  while  vTr6<TTa(ris  was  limited  to  individual  or  concrete 
being.  The  failure  to  recpgnize  this  diJBference  in  the  use  of 
terms  creates  complete  confusion  in  the  translation.  Gregory 
explicitly  holds  that  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit  are  three  indi- 
viduals or  Beings,  and  that  ohffia  is  a  generic  or  universal  term 
and  therefore  must  he  singular. 

The  influence  of  Newman  is  clearly  visible  in  these  new  trans- 
lations of  the  Greek  Fathers,  and  it  is  baneful.  He  failed  to  dis- 
cern the  thoroughly  Aristotelian  character  of  the  Nicene  meta- 
physics, and  assumed  that  in  the  Nicene  Trinity  "  essence  "  in  its 
concrete  sense  and  "  person  "  are  not  coincident,  and  consequently 
that  God  is  one  Being  at  the  same  time  that  He  is  three  Persons. 
See  his  Theological  Tracts^  pp.  259,  265. 

^  Harnack's  Outlines  of  the  History  of  Dogma,  p.  260.  Nicene 
and  Post-Nicene  Fathers,  second  series,  vol.  v.  p.  24.  Gwatkin, 
Studies  ofArianism,  p.  242,  with  a  reference  to  Zahn,  Marcellus, 
87. 

2  In  the  three  Orations  against  the  Arians,  d/xooi<rios  is  used 
but  once,  while  S/ioios  and  its  derivatives  d/xoiooffis  and  S/jloiStijs 
are  used  at  least  thirty-four  times.  The  so-called  Fourth  Ora- 
tion is  directed  rather  against  the  Sabellianism  of  Marcellus. 
Athanasius  here  uses  dfiooiffios  three  times,  and  seems  to  have  no 
fear  of  its  being  charged  with  a  Sabellian  meaning. 


L^ 


66  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

sians.  He  held  out  the  olive  branch  of  peace  to 
the  Semi-Arians ;  and  the  Cappadocians  were  his 
devoted  helpers  in  the  reunion  that  was  finally 
accomplished.  Basil  was  his  personal  friend. 
Gregory  of  Nyssa,  Basil's  younger  brother  and  dis- 
ciple, became  the  acknowledged  head  of  the  Nicene 
party.  Strange  would  it  be  if  these  men  misun- 
derstood the  theological  position  of  their  great 
leader.  But  there  is  no  evidence  of  it  in  their 
voluminous  writings.  Their  doctrinal  watchwords 
are  the  same.  They  contend  against  Arianism  and 
Sabellianism  alike,  defending  the  old  Trinitarian- 
ism  with  the  old  metaphysics  of  generation,  deri- 
vation, and  subordination.  It  is  true  they  were 
ardent  Origenists,  but  Athanasius  himself  had  for 
Origen  only  words  of  praise.  In  one  respect  only 
can  we  detect  a  change.  The  Cappadocians  were 
the  schoolmen  of  the  Greek  Fathers.  They  intro- 
duced a  more  precise  metaphysical  treatment  of 
theological  themes;  but  the  substance  and  even 
form  of  their  doctrine  is  thoroughly  Athanasian. 

To  conclude:  The  words  of  Harnack  on  this 
closing  chapter  of  the  Greek  Trinitarianism  can  be 
truthfully  applied  to  its  whole  history :  "  In  real- 
ity under  the  cover  of  the  o/aoovo-ios  men  indeed 
continued  in  the  Orient  in  a  kind  of  homoiousian- 
ism,  which  is  to  this  day  orthodox  in  aU  their 
churches."  Carlyle  once  voiced  the  traditional 
conception  of  the  Nicene  theology  when  he  de- 
clared that  the  whole  controversy  was  about  a 
diphthong.     In  fact,  it  was  not  a  question  of  a 


ATHANASIANISM  67 

diphthong,  but  of  an  alpha  privative,  "Ofioio^ 
versus  dvo/Aoios  was  the  real  issue.  It  was  Augus- 
tine and  the  Latin  Church  that  changed  the  focus 
of  debate,  and  made  the  diphthong  a  heresy,  by- 
giving  homoousios  a  new  meaning,  and  adding 
filioque  to  the  creed.  It  is  no  wonder  that  a 
schism  followed  between  the  two  churches  which 
has  continued  to  this  day.  The  idea  is  prevalent 
that  this  schism  rests  on  slight  theological  grounds. 
The  very  contrary  is  the  truth.  The  addition  of 
filioque  to  the  Nicene  creed  was  a  radical  over- 
turning of  the  whole  structure.  It  broke  down 
its  monotheism ;  it  reduced  generation  and  sonship 
to  a  metaphor ;  it  turned  three  personal  beings 
into  one  being  reveahng  himself  in  tri-personal 
form ;  it  changed  the  mediating  Logos  into  abso- 
lute Deity.  Such  changes  are  revolutionary.  No 
compromise  was  possible,  or  ever  will  be.  The 
schism  is  complete  and  final. 

Our  survey  of  Athanasianism  here  naturally 
closes.  But  the  question  that  was  raised  at  the 
outset.  Would  Athanasius  recognize  his  New  Eng- 
land disciples  ?  remains  unanswered.  This  re- 
quires a  further  survey  of  the  pseudo-Athanasian 
Augustinianism,  and  its  outcome  in  the  New  Eng- 
land Trinitarianism. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   PSEUDO-ATHANASIAN   AUGUSTINIANI8M 

The  previous  chapter  contained  a  survey  of  the 
development  of  the  Greek  Trinitarianism  until  its 
definite  expression  in  the  Nicene  creed,  and  in  the 
writings  of  Athanasius  and  his  theological  succes- 
sors, Basil  and  the  two  Gregories.  From  this  time 
Greek  theology  ceased  to  be  creative,  and  has  re- 
mained to  this  day  traditional  and  fixed.  The 
Nicene  creed  with  the  Constantinopolitan  amend- 
ments is  still  the  orthodox  definition  of  the  Trinity 
in  the  Greek  Church.  The  later  christological 
controversies  issuing  in  the  decision  of  Chalcedon 
all  assumed  the  truth  of  the  Nicene  doctrine. 
Thus  the  term  Athanasianism  best  expresses  in  a 
summary  way  the  Greek  orthodox  Trinitarianism. 

But  while  Athanasius  himself  was  still  living 
and  in  the  very  crisis  of  his  conflict  with  Arianism, 
a  man  was  bom  in  Tagaste  in  North  Africa  who 
was  to  begin  an  entirely  new  evolution  of  trinita- 
rian  dogma.  Athanasius  died  in  373  A.  D. ;  Augus- 
tine was  born  in  354.  When  he  died  in  Hippo  in 
430  the  Vandals  were  besieging  the  city  and  com- 
pleting the  conquest  of  North  Africa,  —  an  event 
which   significantly  marked  the  political  change 


AUGUSTINIANISM  59 

that  was  rapidly  passing  over  the  Latin-Eoman 
world.  This  change  must  be  thoroughly  under- 
stood in  order  to  a  full  appreciation  of  the  theo- 
logical differences  that  now  arose. 

To  the  historical  student  who  takes  a  wide 
chronological  survey  the  fifth  century  will  stand 
out  at  once  conspicuously  as  one  of  the  most  criti- 
cal epochs  in  the  world's  annals.  Civilization  it- 
self hung  in  the  balance  against  a  resistless  tide  of 
barbarism  that  poured  in  successive  waves  over 
Europe.  The  names  of  Alaric,  Genseric,  Attila, 
Clovis,  Hengist,  and  Horsa  are  simply  the  most 
famous  of  a  long  line  of  invading  warriors  with 
their  multitudinous  followers,  whose  inroads  broke 
in  pieces  the  West  Eoman  empire.  Horde  after 
horde,  Visigoths,  Vandals,  Burgundians,  Huns, 
Ostrogoths,  Franks,  and  Lombards  followed  each 
other,  ravaging  and  pillaging,  and  then  retreating 
to  their  forest  homes,  laden  with  spoils  and  cap- 
tives, or  settling  down  in  the  districts  they  had 
devastated.  Rome  herself  did  not  escape.  Sacked 
once  and  again,  for  years  the  camp  alternately  of 
contending  armies,  she  gradually  lost  her  old  pres- 
tige and  importance,  ceased  to  be  the  capital  of 
the  West,  and  at  last,  as  the  Dark  Ages  came  on, 
became  the  prey  of  warring  ecclesiastical  and  po- 
litical factions  and  dwindled  to  a  city  of  ruins,  her 
great  Coliseum  being  used  as  a  quarry,  and  her 
Forum,  so  fuU  of  historic  memories,  as  a  cattle 
pen.  Thus  was  extinguished  in  Latin  Christen- 
dom that  splendid  Graeco-Roman  civilization  which, 


60  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

with  all  its  faults  and  crimes,  had  given  to  the 
world  its  highest  form  of  intellectual  culture  and 
religious  faith. 

The  effects  of  these  vast  political  and  social 
changes  were  radical  and  momentous.  Theodosius 
the  Great,  who  died  in  395,  was  the  last  ruler  of 
the  united  empire.  From  this  time  the  separation 
of  the  East  from  the  West  grew  more  and  more 
sharply  defined.  Greek  letters,  art,  and  philoso- 
phy recrossed  the  Adriatic  to  their  original  home. 
With  the  surrender  of  the  purple  by  the  last  West 
Koman  emperor  in  476,  political  relations  between 
the  two  parts  of  the  empire  rapidly  declined.  The 
old  Grseco-Roman  world  shrank  into  the  Byzantine, 
with  its  centre  at  Constantinople.  Church  became 
divided  as  well  as  state.  This  period  marks  the 
true  birth  of  the  Papacy,  which  is  a  Latin  institu- 
tion. From  this  time  Latin  creeds  began  to  mul- 
tiply. Thus  the  foundations  were  laid  for  the 
marked  differences  that  began  to  appear  between 
Greek  and  Latin  forms  of  theological  statement. 
This  was  especially  true  of  the  dogma  of  the  Trin- 
ity, which  received  its  new  shaping  most  completely 
at  the  hands  of  Augustine. 

In  order  properly  to  apprehend  the  new  point 
of  view  and  tendency  of  the  Augustinian  Trinita- 
rianism,  somethuig  must  be  said  concerning  the 
sundering  of  relations  which  had  occurred  between 
this  age  and  the  ages  preceding  in  language,  litera- 
ture and  philosophy.  The  culture  of  the  Roman 
Empire  was  largely  derived  from  the  Greeks  whom 


AUGUSTINIANISM  61 

the  Romans  had  conquered  in  the  second  century 
B.  C.  The  Greek  language  became  jpar  excellence 
the  learned  language  of  the  Graeco-Roman  world. 
The  young  men  of  the  Roman  nobility  were  sent 
to  Athens  to  complete  their  education.  Greek 
rhetoricians  and  philosophers  like  Plutarch,  Ploti- 
nus  and  Porphyry  came  to  Rome  to  lecture  and 
teach,  not  learning  Latin,  but  using  their  native 
tongue.  Thus  there  came  to  be  an  essential  unity 
in  the  civilization  and  literature  of  the  empire. 
The  early  Latin  Christian  Fathers  read  the  writ- 
ings of  their  Greek  brethren.  Tertullian  shows 
his  thorough  acquaintance  with  Greek  literature, 
pagan  and  Christian.  He  quotes  Homer,  Herodo- 
tus, and  the  Greek  philosophers,  and  even  wrote 
some  of  his  works  in  Greek.  There  was  also  a 
constant  intercourse  between  the  Greek  and  the 
Latin  churches.  Many  Greeks,  like  Irenseus,  set- 
tled in  the  West  and  became  identified  with  Latin 
Christendom.  In  the  second  and  third  centuries 
every  form  of  culture  was  cosmopolitan.  Greek 
teachers  traveled  everywhere,  and  Greek  letters 
and  schools  of  philosophy  were  spread  into  every 
comer  of  the  Empire.  This  is  illustrated  in  the 
ante-Nicene  theology.  With  minor  divergences 
there  was  a  general  harmony  of  doctrine  between 
the  East  and  the  West.  Especially  is  this  true  of 
the  trinitarian  dogma.  Tertullian,  Irenaeus,  Hip- 
polytus,  Novatian,  Lactantius,  and  Hilary  are  in 
essential  agreement  with  Justin  Martyr,  Origen, 
and  Athanasius.     It  is  one  of  the  mistakes  of  the 


62  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

traditional  view  of  the  early  history  of  Christian 
doctrine  that  Augustine  simply  developed  the  the- 
ology of  the  earlier  Latin  Fathers,  especially  Ter- 
tullian  and  Hilary.  Nothing  can  be  further  from 
the  truth.  This  mistake  has  arisen  in  part  from 
another  mistake,  which  I  fully  explained  in  the 
previous  chapter,  concerning  the  meaning  of  the 
term  o^oovo-tos  as  used  by  the  Greek  theologians. 
It  has  been  taken  for  granted  that  ofioovorios  meant 
numerical  unity  of  essence,  and  that  it  was  so 
understood  by  Latin  as  well  as  Greek  Fathers. 
Hence  the  "  una  substantia "  of  Tertiillian  has 
been  generally  interpreted  in  the  "numerical'' 
sense,  and  Augustine's  doctrine  of  numerical  unity 
has  been  supposed  to  be  derived  from  it.  This 
view  fails  to  appreciate  the  wide  breach  created  by 
the  commotions  and  upheavals  of  the  fourth  and 
fifth  centuries.  The  Latin  Fathers  before  Augus- 
tine universally  held  to  a  trinity  of  three  personal 
beings  united  in  a  generic  unity  by  community  of 
essence.  They  held  to  the  real  subordination  of 
the  Son  to  the  Father,  distinguishing  the  Father, 
as  self-existent  and  the  first  cause,  from  the  Son  as 
derived  and  dependent.  Tertullian,  whose  general 
view  is  very  similar  to  that  of  Justin  Martyr,  even 
held  that  the  Son  had  a  beginning  and  was  a  sort 
of  emanation  from  the  Father's  essence.  Hilary 
of  Gaul,  who  lived  in  the  Nicene  age  and  traveled 
in  the  East,  and  thus  became  thoroughly  acquainted 
with  the  Arian  and  Semi-Arian  controversies,  ex- 
pressly declared  that  to  him  homoousion  and  ho- 


AUGUSTINIANISM  03 

moiousion  meant  the  same  thing,  and  on  this 
ground  urged  the  homoiousian  Semi-Arians  to 
accept  the  Nicene  creed,  thus  following  precisely 
the  lead  of  Athanasius.^     The  idea  that,  there  was 

^  In  the  previous  chapter  I  showed  that  Athanasius  was  quite 
ready  to  adopt  homoiousios  as  a  synonym  for  homoousios  if  its 
meaning*  was  clearly  expressed  aa  implying  conmiunity  of  essence, 
and  distinguishing  the  Son  from  created  beings.  Further,  I  called 
attention  to  the  fact  that  he  usually  employed  the  term  homoios 
rather  than  homoousios  to  set  forth  his  own  doctrine  of  the  Son's 
relation  to  the  Father,  proving  conclusively  that  he  held  to  gen- 
eric unity  of  essence  in  agreement  with  the  Origenistic  school.  If 
he  had  broken  with  Origen  and  his  followers  in  the  use  of  the 
new  term  homoousios,  he  surely  would  not  have  continued  to  use 
the  term  homoios  which  was  the  watchword  of  Origenism,  and 
which  cannot  be  twisted  to  mean  numerical  unity.  A  writer  in 
the  Biblical  World  (April,  1895)  takes  issue  with  me  on  this  point, 
and  quotes  a  passage  from  De  Decretis  which  he  thinks  involves 
the  theory  of  numerical  unity  of  essence  of  the  Trinity.  I  wonder 
if  the  writer  took  care  to  read  the  original  Greek,  for  he  seems 
to  fail  to  understand  that  the  whole  passage  turns  on  the  word 
homoios,  and  is  written  to  explain  how  the  Nicene  bishops  came 
to  substitute  for  it  the  term  homoousios.  Athanasius  says  they 
first  employed  the  term  homoios  to  set  forth  their  doctrine,  —  this 
Origenistic  term  being  antithetic  to  the  Arian  term  heteros,  —  but 
when  they  saw  the  Arians  "  whispering  to  each  other  "  and  ex- 
plaining homoios  in  a  sense  of  their  own,  they  then  insisted  on  the 
term  homoousios,  as  a  word  that  expressed  more  explicitly  essential 
likeness.  The  point  of  contention  between  the  Nicene  Fathers 
and  the  Arians  was  whether  the  Son  was  uncreated  or  created,  in 
other  words,  like  or  unlike  to  the  Father  in  his  essential  being. 
Athanasius  explicitly  asserts  in  this  passage  that  the  bishops 
would  have  been  satisfied  with  homoios  if  the  Arians  had  not 
sought  to  wrest  the  word  from  its  true  meaning,  and  a  clear  light 
is  thus  shed  on  the  real  meaning  of  homoousios,  as  used  by  the 
Nicene  bishops  and  by  Athanasius  himself.  Let  me  further  sug- 
gest to  this  critic  that  if  he  had  quoted  the  whole  of  the  first 
passage  given,  in  its  connection,  instead  of  joining  together  a 
string  of  detached  clauses  that  are  wholly  disconnected,  he  would 
have  rendered  a  real  service  to  his  readers,  instead  of  wholly 


64  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

a  theological  difference  between  the  East  and  the 
West  on  the  question  of  the  Trinity  in  the  third 
century  has  no  foundation  in  fact.  The  breach 
was  later,  .post-Nicene  not  ante-Nicene ;  and  it  was 
a  breach  not  merely  between  the  East  and  the 
West,  but  also  equally  between  the  old  Latin 
world  of  the  West  Koman  Empire  and  the  new 
barbarian  world  that  settled  on  its  ruins.  Augus- 
tine sums  up  in  himseK  this  breach  and  its  charac- 
ter. He  was  not  a  Greek  scholar.  In  his  age  the 
tradition  of  Greek  culture  was  largely  lost.  There 
is  no  evidence  that  he  read  any  of  the  pagan  or 
Christian  Greek  writings  in  the  original.  He  had 
of  course  a  general  traditional  knowledge  of  the 
Greek  philosophers  and  of  the  Greek  Christian 
Fathers.  But  his  knowledge  is  vague  and  gained 
mostly  at  second  hand.  Even  Plato  whom  he  so 
reverenced  was  known  to  him  chiefly  through  the 
New  Platonism  of  Plotinus  and  his  school  in  its 
Latinized  form.  The  culture  of  Augustine  was 
essentially  Latin,  and  even  here  it  was  mostly  con- 
fined to  pagan  and   New  Platonic  sources.     He 

confusing  them.  I  will  only  add  that  no  one  can  get  the  keys  to 
the  understanding  of  Athanasianism  from  any  English  translation 
of  his  writings  extant.  I  have  shown  how  defective  in  this  respect 
is  the  edition  of  the  Nicene  Fathers  recently  published.  The 
volumes  on  Athanasius  and  Gregory  of  Nyssa  are  translated  in 
accordance  with  the  theory  of  numerical  unity  of  essence,  and 
hence  are  wholly  unreliable  in  many  test  passages.  A  scholarly 
translation  free  from  all  theological  bias  is  still  a  desideratum. 
The  critic's  idea  that  my  object  in  writing  was  "  to  aid  in  estab- 
lishing a  harmony  between  Trinitarians  and  Unitarians  "  is  as 
wide  of  the  mark  as  the  rest  of  his  criticism.  He  took  my  irony 
altogether  too  seriously. 


AUGUSTINIANISM  65 

shows  a  narrow  acquaintance  with  the  Latin  Fa- 
,  thers  before  him,  and  quotes  little  from  them.  In 
short,  the  Trinitarianism  of  Augustine  has  little  his- 
torical background.  It  was  mostly  a  new  creation 
from  a  new  standpoint,  which  was  drawn,  not  from 
either  Greek  or  Latin  Christian  sources,  but  from 
the  ideas  which  he  had  imbibed  from  his  philoso- 
phical studies  and  which  he  applied  in  his  own 
original  way  to  the  defense  of  what  he  wrongly  un- 
derstood to  be  trinitarian  orthodoxy.  This  makes 
it  necessary  to  dwell  briefly  on  the  sources  and 
character  of  Augustine's  philosophical  views. 

The  various  currents  of  Graeco-Roman  philoso- 
phy had  gradually  become  concentrated,  in  the  sec- 
ond and  third  centuries,  into  two  great  streams, 
the  Platonico-Aristotelian  with  its  New  Platonic 
modifications,  and  the  Stoic.  The  Greek  world 
adhered  more  closely  to  Platonism,  while  Stoicism, 
which  seems  to  have  been  especially  congenial  to 
the  Romans,  —  witness  the  writings  of  Seneca, 
Epictetus,  and  Marcus  Aurelius,  —  became  the 
reigning  philosophy  of  the  Latin  West.  Plato- 
nism itself,  as  it  moved  westward,  became  mingled 
with  the  Stoic  stream  and  lost  much  of  its  original 
theistic  and  dualistic  character.  Men  called  them- 
selves Platonists,  who  were  such  only  in  name. 
New  Platonism  is  essentially  monistic  and  panthe- 
istic, and  on  this  side  comes  into  close  affiliation 
with  Stoicism,  though  remaining  spiritualistic,  and 
in  this  respect,  holding  to  its  Platonic  source  and 
thus  opposing  the  Stoic  materialism.     The  great 


66  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

question  of  philosophy  in  this  period  was  that  of 
dualism  versus  monism:  in  other  words,  whether 
there  are  two  substances  and  separate  realms  of 
existence  in  the  universe,  —  spiritual  and  material, 
—  or  whether  the  two  are  not  essentially  one. 
Platonism  held  firmly  to  the  ultimate  difference 
between  spirit  and  matter,  and  built  on  this  princi- 
ple its  dualistic  and  spiritualistic  philosophy,  mak- 
ing God  the  Supreme  Spirit  and  the  creator  of 
the  material  world.  Stoicism,  on  the  other  side, 
insisted  on  the  ultimate  unity  of  all  existence,  and 
thus  identified  God  essentially  with  the  world.  On 
this  point  New  Platonism  fell  into  the  monistic 
current  of  the  age,  and  substituted  a  doctrine  of 
evolution  from  the  Supreme  One  to  the  lowest 
forms  of  matter,  in  place  of  the  Platonic  theory  of 
creation,  thus  reducing  the  dualism  of  Plato  to 
unity,  in  harmony  with  Stoic  ideas.  The  radical 
difference  between  the  two  philosophies  is  seen  in 
the  view  taken  of  God's  relation  to  the  material 
universe.  Plato  was  a  transcendentalist.  He  held 
that  God  is  essentially  separate  from  all  created 
things,  though  explicitly  accepting  the  doctrine  of 
God's  providence  and  efficiency  as  active  in  the 
upholding  and  governing  of  the  world  He  has  made. 
Stoicism  made  God  immanent  in  the  world,  redu- 
cing Him  philosophically  to  the  central  principle  or 
force  that  gives  life  and  activity  to  all  things,  thus 
confounding  Him  with  all  the  forms  of  finite  ex- 
istence. As  a  result  Platonism  is  theistic,  regard- 
ing God  as  a  personal  Being  whose  substance  is 


AUGUSTINIANISM  67 

separated  by  an  iniSnite  chasm  from  all  created  or 
material  substance.  "  God,"  says  Plato  in  the 
"Symposium,"  "cannot  mix  with  man."  Stoicism, 
on  the  other  hand,  is  pantheistic,  treating  the  uni- 
verse as  essentially  of  one  essence  evolved  out  of  a 
spermatic  principle  which  is  its  only  Deity.  So 
Platonism  holds  to  the  supernatural,  a  world  above 
nature,  spiritual  and  eternal,  while  Stoicism  is  a 
pure  doctrine  of  nature  and  natural  development 
and  knows  nothing  of  a  distinct  spiritual  kingdom. 
Its  highest  form  of  life  which  it  called  God  by  a 
figure  is  only  a  refined  matter.  The  Greek  Fa- 
thers were  essentially  Platonists.  As  I  explained 
in  the  previous  chapter,  the  whole  Logos  doctrine 
was  founded  on  the  Platonic  transcendental  theory. 
Athanasius  drew  the  line  as  clearly  and  sharply  as 
Plato  himself  between  the  uncreated  and  the  cre- 
ated,—  between  the  absolute  and  the  conditioned. 
Hence  his  strenuous  insistence  on  the  necessity  of 
a  Divine  mediatorship,  which  is  the  cardinal  doc- 
trine of  his  whole  theology.  A  New-Platonic  pan- 
theistic strain  became  mingled  in  later  Greek 
thought,  but  no  traces  of  it  are  to  be  found  in 
Athanasius.  His  doctrine  of  God  and  the  world 
is  theistic  and  transcendental,  with  no  tinge  of 
monism  or  pantheism. 

Augustine  drew  his  philosophical  views  from 
the  opposite  quarter.  The  Stoicism  and  kindred 
New  Platonism  that  permeated  Latin  thought  and 
literature,  even  from  the  time  of  Cicero  and  Varro 
and  Plutarch,  and  became  the  popular  philosophy 


68  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

of  the  following  centuries,  entered  into  his  very- 
bone  and  marrow.  The  philosophical  tendency 
which  was  first  awakened  into  life  by  the  "  Hor- 
tensius"  of  Cicero  was  afterwards  fed  and  ma- 
tured by  the  writings  of  such  New  Platonists  as 
Plotinus,  —  whom  he  may  have  read  in  transla- 
tions,—  Porphyry  and  lamblichus,  and  especially 
the  Latin  Apuleius  who  was  his  fellow-country- 
man. Augustine  in  his  "  Confessions "  gives  a 
clear  account  of  the  influence  of  these  writings 
upon  him,  and  declares  that  they  were  the  provi- 
dential means  of  freeing  him  from  the  Manichean 
dualism,  and  of  preparing  him  for  the  acceptance 
of  Christianity.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  Augus- 
tine's day  there  was  no  distinct  Stoic  sect  as  op- 
posed to  the  so-called  Platonists.  The  eclectic 
tendency  which  began  in  Cicero  and  Plutarch  had 
reached  its  full  development  in  the  later  New 
Platonism  of  Julian,  lamblichus,  Apuleius,  and 
Proclus.  Platonism  had  become  a  name  to  cover 
every  form  of  philosophy  that  held  to  objective 
truth  as  compared  with  the  Epicurean  skepticism. 
But  while  Stoicism  as  a  distinct  philosophy  had 
merged  itself  in  New  Platonism,  by  means  of  the 
pantheism  which  characterized  them  both,  the  in- 
herent materialism  of  the  Stoic  philosophy  still 
leavened  the  thought  of  the  age.  This  is  well 
seen  in  Tertullian,  whose  whole  theology  is  shaped 
by  a  materialistic  cast  of  thought,  and  who  shows 
in  his  writings  a  thorough  acquaintance  with  the 


AUGUSTINIANISM  69 

Stoics,  Zeno  and  Cleanthes.  It  is  ndt  clear  how- 
much  Augustine  was  influenced  by  his  North 
African  predecessor;  but  the  same  materialistic 
tendency  is  visible  in  his  writings,  particularly  in 
his  doctrines  of  original  sin,  irresistible  grace,  the 
sacraments,  and  the  physical  punishments  and  suf- 
ferings of  lost  souls.  Still  more,  however,  was  he 
influenced  by  the  monism  which  was  the  eclectic  and 
harmonizing  principle  that  fused  Stoicism  and  New 
Platonism  together.  Augustine's  whole  philosophy 
starts  with  a  monistic  doctrine  of  unity.  The 
world  is  but  the  expression  of  God.  Augustine 
seems  scarcely  to  admit  what  we  call  second  causes 
or  laws  of  nature.  This  comes  out  clearly  in  his 
controversy  with  the  Pelagians.  He  reduces  the 
system  of  natural  causation  and  law  to  a  direct 
Divine  operation.  In  this  way  he  explains  mira- 
cles as  simply  unusual  modes  of  Divine  efficiency 
in  producing  events.  No  law  of  nature  is  sub- 
verted, for  there  is  no  such  law  to  be  subverted. 
God's  own  immediate  will  is  the  sole  cause  of  all 
things.  This  monistic  theory  appears  also  in  his 
view  of  the  freedom  of  the  human  will  as  consist- 
ing simply  in  voluntariness,  which  itself  is  the  re- 
sult of  a  gracious  Divine  efficiency.  He  carries 
his  doctrine  of  human  dependence  almost  to  the 
point  of  the  Stoic  fatahsm,  declaring  that  "  the 
will  has  power  indeed  for  evil,  but  not  for  good, 
except  as  helped  by  the  infinite  Good."  Thus  the 
Stoic,  New  Platonic  immanence,  with  Augustine, 


70  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

supplants  the  Platonico- Aristotelian  and  Atha- 
nasian  transcendence.^  This  radical  change  of  the 
philosophical  basis  of  truth  differentiates  Augus- 
tinianism  from  Athanasianism  along  the  whole  line 
of  Christian  theology,  and  meets  us  at  once  as  we 
pass  to  consider  more  directly  Augustine's  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity. 

In  this  consideration  it  is  needful  first  of  all 
to  get  a  clear  view  of  the  starting-point  of  Augus- 
tine's inquiries.  His  principal  work  on  the  sub- 
ject is  entitled  "  On  the  Trinity,"  and  he  every- 
where holds  himself  to  be  a  strict  Trinitarian, 
opposing  all  Sabellian  as  well  as  Arian  views.  In 
the  opening  pages  of  his  treatise  he  states  the 
trinitarian  problem  as  "  an  inquiry  into  the  unity 
of  the  Trinity,"  or  "  how  the  Trinity  is  not  three 
Gods  but  one  God."  That  is,  he  seems  to  start 
from  the  three  and  to  proceed  to  the  one.  This 
was  the  method  of  the  earlier  Greek  and  Latin 
Fathers.  The  trinitarian  doctrine  in  its  develop- 
ment began  with  the  acceptance  of  the  three  scrip- 
tural beings,  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost.  Then 
arose  the  question  whether  these  three  divine  be- 
ings were  three  Gods.  This  was  the  core  of  the 
controversies  that  began  to  divide  the  early  Chris- 
tians into  sects.  Orthodoxy,  as  set  forth  by  such 
leaders  as  Justin  Martyr,  Origen,  and  Athanasius, 
attempted  to  explain  how  the  Trinity  could  be 
accepted  without  a  denial  of  monotheism.     The 

^  For  a  criticism  of  the  totally  opposite  view  of  Dr.  A.  V.  Q. 
Allen,  in  his  Continuity  of  Christian  Thought^  see  Appendix  B. 


AUGUSTINIANISM  71 

previous  chapter  treats  this  explanation  at  some 
length.  Enough  now  to  say  that  the  keys  to  it 
are  the  doctrines  of  generic  unity  of  essence,  and 
eternal  generation  of  the  Son,  and  procession  of 
the  Holy  Spirit.  Athanasius  placed  the  Gordian 
knot  of  the  problem  not  in  the  fact  of  the  three 
persons,  but  in  their  metaphysical  or  ideal  union. 
He  held  that  the  Father  is  the  alone  eternal,  self- 
existent  God,  and  that  He  eternally  generated  the 
Son  and  sent  forth  the  Holy  Spirit,  so  that  while 
there  are  three  divine  beings  in  the  Godhead, 
there  are  not  three  eternal  self -existent  Gods, 
since  the  Father  is  the  source  of  being  to  the 
others  who  are  thus  dependent  and  subordinate, 
though  receiving  from  the  Father  all  divine  attri- 
butes. Augustine  seems  to  start  from  the  same 
point  of  view,  but  as  he  proceeds  we  find  that  the 
problem  really  discussed  is  just  the  reverse.  It 
is  not  how  the  three  are  one,  but  how  the  one  is 
three.  The  explanation  of  this  change  of  front, 
of  which  Augustine  himself  seems  not  to  be  aware, 
is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  he  began  by  treat- 
ing the  Trinity  as  a  problem  of  faith ;  but  it  soon 
developed  into  a  problem  of  reason.  His  whole 
argument  starts  on  the  basis  of  Scripture  and 
revelation,  but  gradually  passes  into  the  remotest 
regions  of  philosophy.  In  fact,  the  book  is  a  most 
remarkable  patchwork  of  appeal  to  authority  and 
to  reason,  and  contains  some  of  the  wildest  speci- 
mens of  theological  metaphysics  that  can  be  found 
anywhere  in  the  whole  range  of   historical  the- 


72  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

ology.  This  is  one  of  the  fundamental  differences 
between  Athanasius  and  Augustine.  With  Athsr 
nasius  Scripture  is  always  primary  and  reason 
secondary.  The  reverse  is  true  of  Augustine. 
The  result  was  that  Augustine  in  his  whole  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity  paid  little  respect  to  previous 
theological  systems  or  speculations.  He  supposed 
himself,  it  is  true,  to  be  following  iu  the  footsteps 
of  his  orthodox  predecessors.  No  doubt  he  be- 
lieved himself  to  be  in  full  accord  with  Athanasius 
and  the  Nicene  Greek  Fathers.  But  he  had  little 
scholarship  or  critical  sagacity.  The  whole  turn 
of  his  mind  and  training  was  toward  philosophy ; 
and  he  thus  at  once  left  the  beaten  track  of  tradi- 
tional Trinitarianism  and  moved  out  along  the  line 
of  his  own  philosophical  ideas.  Those  ideas,  as  we 
have  seen,  were  wholly  monistic.  The  New  Pla- 
tonic leaven  in  him  was  pervasive,  though  it  did 
not  carry  him  to  the  point  of  absolute  pantheism. 
From  this  he  was  saved  by  the  clear  monotheism 
of  the  Bible.  But  he  took  the  first  step  toward 
pantheism,  as  we  shall  see  more  clearly  in  our  fur- 
ther consideration  of  his  views. 

Aug-ustine  starts  from  the  assumption  that  there 
is  but  one  eternal  substance  in  the  universe.  This 
one  substance  is  God.  God  then,  as  a  being,  is 
essentially  one.  He  is  "  una  res,^'  "  summa  sim- 
plex essentia,^^  Augustine's  language  and  whole 
(line  of  argimient  show  that  he  held  tp  the  idea  of 
"  a  numerical  rather  than  a  generic  unity  of  essence. 
This  was  his  interpretation   of  6/aoowios.     With 


AUGUSTINIANISM  73 

him,  essence,  in  the  case  of  God,  is  not  abstract 
but  concrete.  The  terms  genus  and  species  he 
declares  cannot  be  applied  to  God  as  they  are  to 
men.  God's  essence  is  his  actual  being.  If  God 
is  personal,  his  essence  is  personal,  that  is  con- 
crete. "  To  God,"  he  says,  "  it  is  not  one  thing 
to  6e,  another  to  he  a  person^  but  it  is  absolutely 
the  same  thing."  Hence  he  continually  passes 
from  ^'unum'*^  as  descriptive  of  the  one  essence, 
to  ^'•unus^^  and  describes  the  Trinity  as  ^^unus 
Deus^  For  Augustine,  then,  the  trinitarian  pro- 
blem is  how  this  one  God,  "  unus  Deus^"*  can  be 
three  or  a  "  trinitasy  He  assumes  it  to  be  a  fact. 
He  continually  puts  unus  Deus  and  trinitas  into 
juxtaposition  as  essentially  coincident.  He  de- 
clares repeatedly  that  one  God  and  trinity  are  the 
same  thing.  Thus  Augustine  confounds  monothe- 
ism with  trinitarianism,  and  changes  trinity  into 
tri-unity.  His  trinity  is  one  divine  Being,  not 
three  beings.  What  then  is  the  peculiarity  of 
Augustinian  Trinitarianism?  He  allows  that  Fa- 
ther, Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are  three.  But  three 
what  ?  three  beings  ?  No.  Three  persons  ?  Here 
we  touch  the  critical  point.  Augustine  explains 
how  the  term  "  person  "  came  to  be  used  by  the 
Latins,  but  declares  that  it  is  not  employed  in  the 
proper  sense  of  a  personal  being.  The  sum  of  his 
answer  is  that  the  term  "  person  "  is  used  nega- 
tively rather  than  positively  in  default  of  any  more 
exact  term,  and  in  order  to  be  able  to  give  some  sort 
of  answer  to  those  who  ask  what  three :  "  that  we 


74  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

might  not  be  altogether  silent  when  asked,  what 
three,  while  we  confessed  that  they,  are  three." 
He  enters  into  a  curious  discussion  of  the  ques- 
tion whether,  since  God  is  one  essence,  He  is  not 
also  properly  called  one  person,  and  on  the  other 
hand  whether,  if  there  are  three  persons,  it  is  not 
proper  to  call  them  three  essences  or  three  Gods. 
He  allows  the  logical  truth  of  these  conclusions, 
but  refuses  to  accept  them  in  the  explanation  of 
the  Trinity,  and  frankly  acknowledges  that  the 
problem  is  insoluble.  "It  is  feared  to  say  three 
essences,"  nor  "  can  it  be  said  that  there  are  not 
three  somewhats."  It  is  plain  that  all  through 
this  discussion  Augustine  is  playing  with  words. 
In  fact  he  confesses  it.  "  Such  words  are  em- 
ployed," he  says,  "  that  there  may  be  something 
to  say ;  "  and  again,  "  from  the  necessity  of  speak- 
ing, when  copious  reasoning  is  required  against  the 
devices  or  errors  of  the  heretics." 

What  then  did  Augustine  mean  by  "  three  per- 
sons "  or  "  somewhats,"  if  not  three  personal  be- 
ings? Was  he  a  Sabellian  without  knowing  it, 
and  even  while  striving  to  distinguish  his  doctrine 
from  that  of  SabeUius  ?  This  cannot  be  affirmed 
without  some  explanation.  Augustine  did  not 
start  from  the  Sabellian  premise  of  an  evolution 
in  God  from  unity  to  trinity ;  nor  did  he  develop 
a  Sabellian  doctrine  of  Christ.  But  while  he  did 
not  adopt  the  Sabellian  premise,  his  own  monistic 
New  Platonic  premise  led  him  to  the  Sabellian 
conclusion,  viz.,  that  the  "  three  somewhats "  or 


AUGUSTINIANISM  75 

"  persons  "  so-called  of  the  Trinity  are  only  triple 
modes  or  relations  of  the  one  essence  or  being  of 
God.  The  critical  test  of  SabeUianism  versus  the 
Nicene  doctrine  is  whether  the  Trinity  is  essen- 
tially one  Being  or  three  Beings.  SabeUianism 
says  one  Being ;  Athanasianism  says  three  Beings. 
Hence  SabeUianism  is  monistic,  whUe  Athanasian- 
ism is  trinitarian.  Here  Augustine  plainly  sides 
with  SabeUius.  A  remarkable  passage  in  his 
"  Tractate  on  the  Fourth  Gospel  *'  brings  out  his 
position  clearly :  "  The  Trinity  is  one  God ;  three, 
but  not  three  Gods.  Three  what,  then  ?  I  reply : 
The  Father,  and  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit." 
But  can  the  three  be  numbered,  as  three  men  can 
be  ?  Here  Augustine  wavers.  *'  If  you  ask :  '  three 
what  ? '  number  ceases.  When  you  have  numbered, 
you  cannot  teU  what  you  have  numbered.  Only 
in  their  relations  to  each  other  do  they  suggest 
number,  not  in  their  essential  existence.  I  have 
no  name  to  give  the  three,  save  the  Father,  the 
Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit,  one  God,  one  Almighty, 
and  so  one  beginning."  Here  the  monism  of 
Augustine  fuUy  appears.  The  only  numbering, 
he  declares,  that  can  apply  to  God  is  that  of  his 
essence,  which  is  one.  When  the  Trinity  is  spoken 
of,  "  number  fails."  This  must  mean  that  Augus- 
tine did  not  regard  the  "  three  "  as  real  and  dis- 
tinct existences  or  individuals  which,  of  course, 
can  be  numbered,  but  only  as  modes  or  relations, 
in  triple  form,  of  one  existence  or  individual. 
Hence  his  hesitation  and  play  of  words  concern- 


76  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

ing  the  term  "  person."  It  is  to  him  a  makeshift 
for  what  is  not  a  person.  God,  for  Augustine,  is 
one  Being  and  so  one  Person,  not  three  Persons. 
These  three  are  unus  Deus^  that  is,  one  Personal 
Being.  The  three  persons  so-called  are  merely 
three  relative  forms  under  which  the  one  God  is 
manifested  in  the  revelation  of  himself  to  men. 
It  is  not  to  be  inferred,  however,  that  Augustine 
regarded  these  forms  or  relations  as  superficial  or 
transitory.  Here  again  he  separated  himself  from 
the  SabeUians.  The  Trinity,  according  to  Augus- 
tine, is  the  essential  mode  of  the  Divine  existence. 
On  this  point  he  is  thoroughly  Athanasian.  The 
one  God  is  eternally  a  Trinity.  Augustine  does 
not  go  so  far  as  his  later  followers,  in  insisting 
that  God  could  not  exist  except  in  trinity,  but  he 
regards  trinity  as  an  ultimate  fact  in  God ;  so  es- 
sential is  it  that  he  looks  upon  the  whole  universe 
as,  in  some  sense,  trinitarian,  and  seeks  to  find 
images  and  traces  of  trinity  not  only  in  man,  but 
in  nature  in  all  its  forms,  and  even  in  the  triple 
character  of  ancient  philosophy.  But  these  very 
analogies  show  the  essentially  Sabellian  character 
of  Augustine's  view.  These  images  of  trinity  are 
modal  and  relational,  as,  for  example,  the  illustra- 
tion of  the  triple  nature  of  the  human  mind,  or 
of  the  body,  or  of  the  departments  of  philosophy. 
Such  illustrations  fairly  image  forth  the  Sabellian 
doctrine,  but  not  the  Athanasian.  Athanasius  fre- 
quently illustrates  his  doctrine  by  the  case  of  a 
human  father  and  son,  and  of  human  persons  gen- 


AUGUSTINIANISM  77 

erally,  but  Augustine  expressly  sets  such  illustra- 
tions aside  as  illegitimate.  The  reason  is  plain. 
Athanasius  describes  the  relations  which  exist  be- 
tween three  divine  Beings.  Augustine  describes 
the  relations  or  modes  of  existence  of  one  Being, 
manifesting  himseK  under  different  forms  and 
names.  The  personal  forms  are  three,  but  the 
personal  centre,  the  personality  itself,  is  one. 
This,  however,  is  just  what  Athanasius  flouted  as 
Sabellianism.  "For  they  are  one  («/)  not  as  of 
one  twice  named,  so  that  the  same  being  is  in  one 
way  Father  and  in  another  way  (aXAorc)  his  Son ; 
for  Sabellius  holding  this  view  was  judged  a  her- 
etic; but  they  are  two  (8vo  fikv  cto-tv),  since  the 
Father  is  Father  and  is  not  at  the  same  time  Son, 
and  the  Son  is  Son  and  is  not  at  the  same  time 
Father;  but  the  nature  is  one  (/Ata  8e  17  <^vo-ts),  and 
all  things  that  belong  to  the  Father  belong  also  to 
the  Son."  1 

We  note  here  the  sharp  difference  between 
Augustine  and  Athanasius.  Augustine  declares 
that  "  when  the  Trinity  is  spoken  of  number  fails." 
"  Three  "  is  but  a  metaphor.  Number  only  ap- 
plies strictly  to  God  as  one.  Athanasius  reverses 
this.  His  position  is  that  number  applies  properly 
rather  to  the  Trinity.  He  insists  on  the  number- 
ing of  the  persons  as  essential  to  the  truth  against 
Sabellius.  "Two,"  he  declares,  "is  not  a  mere 
name  for  one,  but  is  a  reality."  It  is  rather,  he 
says  elsewhere,  in  regard   to   the   divine   essence 

^  Third  Oration  against  the  Arians^  4. 


78  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

that  "  number  fails  :  "  since  essence  is  abstract  and 
universal,  and  so  does  not  submit  to  number,  that 
is,  cannot  be  individualized.  Only  individuals  can 
be  numbered,  not  universals.  Tbis  was  tbe  teach- 
ing of  all  the  Greek  Fathers.  They  held  to  three 
real  subsistences  or  individuals  in  the  Trinity 
(rpcts  vTToo-Tao-cts  =  tres  res'),  and  hence  put  the 
numerical  term  rpta?  into  the  forefront  of  their 
doctrine  and  called  themselves  Trinitarians. 
Gregory  Nazianzen,  for  example,  says  the  Trinity 
is  "  divided  in  number  "  (dpi^/xw  SLa<J>6prj'),  So  John 
of  Damascus  says  that  persons  are  distinguished 
by  number  but  not  by  nature.  For  "  a  person 
exists  by  itself,  but  essence  does  not  exist  by  itseK 
but  as  seen  in  persons."  Nothing  could  more 
clearly  set  forth  the  trinitarianism  of  the  Greeks 
as  distinguished  from  that  of  Augustine ;  and  the 
secret  of  that  difference  is  that  the  Greek  Fathers 
built  their  doctrine  on  the  philosophical  distinc- 
tions of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  while  Augustine  based 
his  on  the  essential  monism  of  New  Platonism. 
This  appears  in  his  whole  treatment  and  interpre- 
tation of  the  Bible.  Everywhere  he  finds  trinity 
as  well  as  unity.  The  Jehovah  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment is  at  the  same  time  the  one  God  and  the 
Trinity.  He  interprets  the  Divine  appearances  to 
Adam,  to  Abraham,  to  Moses,  as  sometimes  of  the 
Father,  sometimes  of  the  Son,  and  sometimes  of 
the  whole  Trinity,  and  holds,  moreover,  that  when- 
ever God  appears  as  a  single  person  (Father,  Son, 
or  Holy  Spirit),  or  when  any  act  is  performed  in 


AUGUSTINIANISM  79 

the  person  of  either,  the  whole  Trmity  is  concerned. 
Thus  though  the  Son  only  was  incarnate,  the  whole 
Trinity  wrought  the  incarnation,  so  that  the  Son 
is  made  to  bear  a  part  in  his  own  incarnation.  In 
the  same  way  it  was  the  Son  as  Christ  that  died, 
but  the  Father  also  was  actively  concerned  in  it, 
—  a  view  that  is  perilously  close  to  the  old  Patri- 
passianism.  Everything  that  Christ  did  in  the 
flesh,  the  Father  did  also.  Augustine  even  repre- 
sents the  Father  as  walking  on  the  sea.  Such 
utter  confusion  of  the  agency  of  the  three  persons 
was  wholly  foreign  to  Athanasius.  It  is  true  that 
he  sometimes  represents  the  action  of  the  Father 
as  involved  in  that  of  the  Son  in  language  that 
reminds  us  of  Augustine.  But  a  study  of  such 
passages  in  their  context  will  show  that  Athana- 
sius' point  of  view  is  entirely  different.  He  never 
confounds  the  Father  or  the  Son  with  the  Trinity. 
To  him  the  Trinity  is  always  plural,  never  singular. 
He  distinguishes  the  agency  of  the  Son  in  creation 
from  that  of  the  Father.  The  Father  wills,  the 
Son  executes.  So  in  regard  to  the  incarnation, 
death,  and  resurrection  of  Christ.  Athanasius 
avoids  all  Patripassian  tendencies.  "  It  was  not 
the  Father  that  was  made  man.  For  it  follows, 
when  the  Lord  is  called  the  vine,  that  there  must 
be  a  husbandman,  and,  when  he  prayed,  that  there 
was  one  to  hear,  and,  when  he  asked,  that  there 
was  one  to  give.  Now  such  things  show  far  more 
readily  the  madness  of  the  Sabellians,  because  he 
that  prayed  was  one,  he  that  heard  another,  one 


80  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

the  vine,  another  the  husbandman."  Athanasius 
holds,  indeed,  to  the  unity  of  agency  of  Father  and 
Son,  but  this  unity  is  conceived  not  pantheistically, 
but  as  growing  out  of  their  metaphysical  relation, 
the  Father  being  the  fons  et  origo  of  the  Son's 
agency,  though  as  agents  they  are  two  and  their 
acts  are  personally  distinct.  John  of  Damascus 
represents  the  whole  Greek  theology  when  he  says : 
*'  The  Father  and  the  Holy  Spirit  have  no  com- 
munion with  the  Incarnation  of  the  Word,  except 
by  approbation  and  assent."  The  prayer  with 
which  Augustine  concludes  his  work  on  the  Trinity 
well  summarizes  the  monistic  and  modalistic  char- 
acter of  his  Trinitarianism.  It  is  addressed  to  the 
Trinity.  But  the  Trinity  is  described  as  "one 
Lord  God,"  and  the  whole  prayer  is  in  the  singu- 
lar number.  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are 
confounded  as  one  Person.  "  O  Lord,  the  one 
God,  God  the  Trinity,  whatever  is  said  in  these 
books  that  is  of  thine  may  they  acknowledge  who 
are  thine."  No  wonder  that  Calvin,  stout  Augus- 
tinian  as  he  was,  should  have  protested  against  such 
a  form  of  prayer,  which  seems  to  have  been  com- 
mon in  his  day.  "  It  is  a  common  prayer :  '  Holy 
Trinity,  one  God,  have  mercy  upon  us.'  It  dis- 
pleases me  and  savors  throughout  of  barbarism." 

We  are  now  at  a  point  where  we  can  understand 
how  Augustine  was  led  to  eliminate  aU  subordina^ 
tion  from  his  trinitarian  doctrine.  The  traditional 
view  which  regards  Augustine  as  a  true  disciple  of 
Athanasianism  has   never   been   able   to   explain 


AUGUSTINIAKISM  81 

satisfactorily  this  feature  of  Augustine's  doctrine. 
The  common  explanation  has  been  that  the  Athar 
nasian  homoousian  doctrine  makes  the  Son  equal  to 
the  Father,  and  that  the  ground  was  thus  prepared 
for  the  step  taken  by  Augustine.  But  this  cannot 
be  allowed.  Athanasius  held  that  the  Son  was  a 
derived  being :  he  insisted  strongly  on  the  distinc- 
tion between  airio?  and  atTtaros.  The  Son  was  not 
self-existent,  but  dependent  eternally  on  the  Fa- 
ther. Subordination  was  thus  an  essential  element 
in  the  Athanasian  doctrine.  To  be  sure,  Athana- 
sius borrows  from  Paul  the  term  "  equal ;  "  but  he 
explains  it,  in  harmony  with  his  subordination 
doctrine,  to  set  forth  his  view  that  the  Son  is  of 
divine  origin  and  nature  and  possesses  by  derivar 
tion  all  divine  attributes.  The  step  that  Augustine 
took  could  never  have  been  taken  from  the  stand- 
point of  Athanasius.  Subordination  has  always 
remained  the  central  feature  of  all  Greek  theology. 
It  is  the  new  philosophic  starting-point  of  Augus- 
tine that  explains  the  elimination  of  all  subordina- 
tion from  his  system.  God,  in  his  view,  is  essen- 
tially one  ;  yet  He  is  a  trinity,  but  not  a  trinity  of 
real  personal  beings  ;  the  personal  centre  is  one. 
The  three  persons,  so-called,  are  not  subsistences  or 
individuals ;  they  are  modes  of  the  one  divine  exist- 
ence. How  Augustine  explained  the  terms  "  gen- 
eration" and  "procession,"  as  applied  to  the  Son 
and  Holy  Spirit,  it  is  difficult  to  say.  He  cannot 
have  accepted  them  literally.  They  belong  with 
the  term  "  person  "  to  Augustine's  negative  nomen- 


82  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

clature.  For  Augustine  generation  did  not  in- 
volve any  real  derivation  or  dependence.  The  Son 
is  as  truly  and  absolutely  God  as  the  Father.  God 
is  as  self-existent  and  eternal  in  the  Son  and  Holy 
Spirit  as  in  the  Father.  Each  form  or  mode  of 
the  Divine  Being  involves  the  whole  Divine  Being. 
Subordination,  therefore,  is  impossible.  "Rela- 
tions," as  Augustine  termed  them,  in  the  Trinity 
can  have  no  essential  significance.  They  are  not 
beings  or  essences,  but  only  qualities  of  beings. 
The  only  superiority  of  the  Father  is  that  he  is 
first  in  order.  Here  is  the  germ  of  the  official 
subordination  that  has  played  such  a  part  in  later 
trinitarian  history.  In  Augustine's  doctrine  Jesus 
Christ  is  absolute  Deity,  the  whole  of  God.  He 
is  the  Jehovah  of  the  Old  Testament,  nay,  he  is  in 
fact  the  whole  Trinity,  for  God  is  trinity ;  one  is 
three  and  three  is  one,  and  so  absolutely  that  the 
Trinity  is  properly  addressed  as  a  singular  being, 
and  Augustine's  prayer  to  the  Trinity  was  equally 
a  prayer  to  Christ,  to  the  Father,  to  the  Holy 
Spirit,  to  all  three  together  and  to  the  singular 
whole,  which  is  aU  three.  Such  is  the  amazing 
antinomy  of  the  Augustinian  Trinitarianism.  How 
so  logical  a  thinker  could  have  thus  lost  himself 
in  the  mazes  of  monism  and  played  jumping- jack 
with  his  own  logic  would  be  a  profound  mystery 
to  any  one  who  had  not  studied  the  history  of 
human  speculation.  Curiously  enough,  Augustine 
seems  to  have  still  supposed  himself  to  be  a  be- 
liever in  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit  as  three 


AUGUSTINIANISM  83 

personal  agents ;  but  there  is  no  evidence  that  he 
ever  attempted  to  harmonize  his  trinitarian  faith 
with  his  unitarian  theology. 

Before  passing  to  consider  the  outcome  of  Augus- 
tinianism  in  later  histoiy,  it  may  be  well  to  note 
several  of  the  more  radical  changes  in  theological 
thought  that  resulted  from  the  new  Augustinian 
views.  In  the  first  place,  Augustine's  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity  tended  to  break  down  the  Christian 
Athanasian  doctrine  of  mediator  ship.  This  doc- 
trine is  central  not  only  in  the  New  Testament,  but 
also  in  Greek  theology.  The  Logos  doctrine  is 
the  speculative  expression  of  it.  The  redemption 
of  man  by  a  mediating  being  who  partakes  of 
divine  as  well  as  human  nature  is  the  great  theme 
of  the  Athanasian  argument  against  Arius.  In 
Augustine's  day  the  Atonement  was  not  discussed. 
The  doctrine  of  a  Divine  Kedeemer  was  thrown 
into  the  background  by  the  Pelagian  controversy 
concerning  man  and  the  origin  of  evil.  Christ's 
work  as  a  Saviour  was  not  lost  sight  of,  but  Augus- 
tine's view  of  him  as  essentially  the  absolute  God 
led  inevitably  to  a  confusion  of  his  mediatorial 
function  with  the  other  functions  of  the  Godhead. 
The  one  God  in  Trinity  was  made  the  agent  in  the 
atonement  as  in  all  other  divine  activities.  How 
far  Augustine  himself  was  affected  in  his  views  of 
Christ's  mediatorial  work  by  his  monistic  Trini- 
tarianism  his  writings  do  not  disclose.  But  the 
seed  sown  soon  brought  forth  its  natural  fruit. 
Mediaeval  theology,  which  is   essentially  Angus- 


84  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tinian,  so  confounded  Christ  with  God  the  Father 
that  instead  of  making  him  the  expression  and 
representation  of  Divine  mercy  and  intercession, 
as  the  earlier  theology  had  always  done,  it  made  him 
rather  the  representative  of  Divine  justice  and 
punishment.  Mediaeval  art  is  on  this  point  a  true 
and  telling  witness.  The  face  of  Christ,  which  in 
early  art  was  benignant  and  compassionate,  be- 
comes hard  and  severe,  and  in  the  frequent  judg- 
ment scenes  he  is  pictured  as  on  the  throne  wrath- 
ful and  vengeful,  and  in  the  act  of  punishing  the 
guilty.  No  wonder  that  the  cult  of  the  Virgin 
Mary  became  so  popular.  Its  growth,  with  all  the 
superstitions  involved,  was  the  protest  of  heavy- 
laden  souls,  longing  for  some  way  of  access  to  the 
mercy  of  God,  when  the  old  and  living  way  through 
Christ  had  been  closed.  Anselm's  "Cur  Deus 
Homo  "  —  a  work  which  was  epoch-making  in  its 
influence  upon  the  mediaeval  views  of  the  atone- 
ment —  illustrates  forcibly  the  effect  of  the  Augus- 
tinian  type  of  doctrine.  The  treatise  is  pervaded 
with  a  thinly-disguised  Patripassianism  and  Mono- 
physitism.  The  very  title  is  suggestive.  It  is  not 
"Why  the  Christ,"  but  "Why  the  God-man?" 
Anselm's  Redeemer  is  God  himself,  not  another 
mediating  being,  such  as  the  Logos  of  Greek  the- 
ology. The  question  raised  at  the  outset  is,  "  By 
what  necessity  and  for  what  reason  God,  since  He 
is  omnipotent,  took  on  himseK  the  humiliation  and 
weakness  of  human  nature  for  the  sake  of  its 
restoration  ? "      Here   the   mediating  element   is 


AUGUSTINIANISM  86 

wholly  absent.  A  mediator  implies  two  parties. 
Anselm  confounds  one  party  and  the  mediator 
together.  He  represents  God  as  "descending  to 
the  Virgin's  womb "  and  "  enduring  weariness, 
hunger,  thirst,  strokes,  crucifixion,  and  death." 
God  "  the  Creator,"  who  "  made  Adam,"  "  re- 
deemed" us  "by  his  own  blood"  "from  sin  and 
from  his  own  wrath."  Such  language  runs  through 
the  whole  book.  Sometimes  it  becomes  grossly 
Patripassian  or  monistic.  Speaking  of  the  death 
of  Christ,  he  says  :  "  No  one  would  knowingly  kill 
God."  The  point  of  all  this  mode  of  speech  is 
explained  by  Anselm  himself.  Christ,  he  says,  is 
"  the  whole  Trinity."  "  In  one  person  the  whole 
Godhead  is  meant."  "  Since  he  himself  is  God, 
the  Son  of  God,  he  offered  himself  for  his  own 
honor  to  himself,  as  he  did  to  the  Father  and  the 
Holy  Spirit."  Thus  the  whole  gospel  idea  of  a 
daysman  between  God  and  men,  a  Messiah  and 
mediator  whom,  "in  the  fullness  of  time,"  God 
sent,  "  because  He  so  loved  the  world,"  is  dissolved 
into  the  crude  materialism  of  the  early  heretics. 
God  is  made  to  send  himself,  to  be  born,  to  suffer 
and  die,  and  this  to  save  men  from  the  effects  of 
his  own  wrath.  Is  it  any  wonder  that  modern 
discussions  on  the  atonement  could  never  reach  a 
satisfactory  result  on  the  Anselmic  basis  ?  An- 
selm's  God-man  is  both  the  Being  to  be  propitiated 
and  the  Being  that  propitiates,  a  kind  of  Dr. 
Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde,  now  the  omnipotent  and 
eternal  God   and  anon  the   "  man  of  sorrows." 


86  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

This  may  be  truth,  as  some  still  believe,  but  it  is 
not  the  old  gospel  of  a  Messiah.  Christ's  voice  is 
no  longer  heard  saying,  "  If  ye  shall  ask  anything 
in  my  name  that  will  I  do,  and  I  will  pray  the 
Father."  On  the  Angus tinian-Anselmic  theory 
Christ  prays  to  himself,  and  this  is  no  prayer  at 
all.  The  real  intercessory  element  is  gone.  One 
of  the  chief  results  of  recent  Biblical  investigation 
has  been  the  restoration  of  the  historical  Christ, 
with  those  features  of  his  earthly  life  that  reveal 
him  as  our  true  elder  brother,  and  thus  our  fit 
representative  before  God. 

A  second  effect  of  Augustine's  new  Trinitarian- 
ism  was  to  break  down  the  monotheistic  view  of 
God,  As  I  showed  in  the  previous  chapter,  mono- 
theism lies  at  the  basis  of  Athanasianism.  The 
Nicene  creed  gave  the  keynote  of  aU  Greek  the- 
ology in  its  opening  words,  —  "  We  believe  in  one 
God,  the  Father  Almighty."  Monotheism,  or 
theism,  in  the  philosophical  sense,  holds  that  God 
is  a  single  personal  being.  It  emphasizes  person- 
ality as  the  true  centre  and  test  of  all  spiritual 
substance.  The  spiritual  world  is  composed  of 
persons.  If  God  is  spirit.  He  is  a  Person.  Moral 
life  involves  a  moral  self-consciousness  with  its 
capacity  of  distinguishing  the  J^go  from  the  non- 
Ego^  and  this  is  what  is  meant  by  personality. 
The  limit  of  a  spiritual  substance  is  its  range  of 
self-consciousness.  There  are  as  many  spiritual 
beings  as  there  are  centres  of  seK-consciousness. 
Theism  holds  that  God,  in  whose  moral  image  we 


AUGUSTINIANISM  87 

are,  is  such  a  self-conscious  Beiug.  Pantheism,  on 
the  contrary,  makes  self-consciousness,  or  person- 
ality, only  a  quality  or  accident  of  substance,  so 
that  there  may  be  only  one  spiritual  substance  and 
yet  many  persons.  It  was  the  great  virtue  of  the 
original  Platonism,  especially  in  its  Aristotelian 
form,  that  it  was  firmly  theistic.  Zeller,  in  his 
notable  "  History  of  Greek  Philosophy,"  declares 
that  Plato  never  raised  the  question  squarely  of 
God's  personality.  This  may  be  so ;  but,  for  all 
that,  Plato  was  theistic  to  the  core.  His  pro- 
nounced dualism,  with  its  clear  line  between  spirit 
and  matter,  rests  upon  a  theistic  basis.  Call  his 
"  Timaeus  "  a  poem  if  you  please,  it  speaks  a  true 
voice  and  tells  us  plainly  of  his  faith  in  a  personal 
God,  the  supreme  maker  of  the  universe.  The 
theism  of  Plato  is  the  monotheism  of  Paul  and 
Athanasius.  They  never  thought  of  calling  the 
one  God  the  Trinity,  as  if  the  Trinity  was  a  single 
being.  "  To  us  there  is  one  God  the  Father  and 
one  Lord  Jesus  Christ."  But  Augustine  had 
drunk  from  a  different  philosophical  stream.  New 
Platonism  is  thoroughly  pantheistic,  and  Augus- 
tine's whole  theology  is  saturated  with  New  Platonic 
influences. 

It  cannot  be  known  exactly  how  much  indebted 
Augustine  was  to  the  "  renowned  "  Plotinus,  as  he 
calls  him,  but  plainly,  in  some  way,  he  had  deeply 
imbibed  the  spirit  of  his  teachings,  for  Plotinus 
was  the  most  famous  philosopher  of  the  New  Pla- 
tonist  school  which  Augustine  rates  so  highly,  — 


88  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

"  they  approach  nearest  to  us,"  he  says,  —  as  he 
was  the  most  original  thinker  since  Aristotle. 
Nowhere  in  literature  can  a  clearer  or  profounder 
analysis  of  the  pantheistic  doctrine  be  found  than 
in  the  "  Enneads  "  of  Plotinus,  nor  a  more  re- 
markable description  of  the  New  Platonic  Trinity 
than  in  the  first  Book  of  the  fifth  "  Ennead,"  en- 
titled :  Ilepi  tC)v  rpLoiv  ap^^iKiov  VTrocTTcurLiav,  Here  are 
three  hypostases,  to  ov,  vovs,  and  tlruxvy  placed  at  the 
head  of  the  New  Platonic  pantheon,  and  united  by 
a  pantheistic  evolution  in  one  eternal  substance. 
Here,  too,  are  found  those  theological  terms  that 
became   the    watchwords   of   Christian   doctrine: 

Aoyos,     yevvrja-LSi     cIkiov,      <f>u>s,    (XTravyacr/xa,     o/xoovctos. 

These  terms  are  used  to  set  forth  a  trinity  with 
relations  of  generation,  subordination,  and  homo- 
ousian  unity  that  make  it  seem  a  transcript  of  the 
doctrine  of  Origen  and  Athanasius,  only  that  it  is 
cast  in  pantheistic  form.  The  question  naturally 
arises  whether  there  was  any  historical  connection 
between  the  two  doctrines,  so  similar  in  their 
nomenclature.  But  there  is  no  evidence  of  it. 
On  the  contrary,  they  were  both  plainly  drawn, 
through  independent  channels,  from  the  common 
sources  of  earlier  philosophy.  Plato  himself  gives 
the  basis  of  the  Plotinian  Trinity  in  his  triad  of 
6  wv,  the  Supreme  God,  vovs  or  X6yo?,  the  mediating 
principle,  and  ifrvx^,  the  world-soul.  The  idea  that 
Plotinus  borrowed  his  doctrine  from  Christianity  is 
utterly  without  foundation.  It  is  a  more  pertinent 
question  whether  Augustine  was  directly  acquainted 
with  the  "  Enneads  "  of  Plotinus.     Had  he  read 


AUGUSTINIANISM  89 

them  in  a  Latin  translation  ?  It  cannot  be  as- 
serted decisively.  The  several  personal  references 
and  citations  in  "  De  Civitate  Dei "  are  not  con- 
clusive.^    But  this  is  certain,  that  his  doctrine  of 

1  Dr.  Hamack  seems  to  assert  it.  He  says  (History  of  Dogmas 
vol.  i.  p.  358) :  "  We  know  that  the  rhetorician  Marios  Victo- 
rinus  translated  the  writings  of  Plotinus.  This  translation  ex- 
erted a  decisive  influence  on  the  mental  history  of  Augustine,  who 
borrowed  from  New  Platonism  the  best  it  had,  its  psychology, 
introduced  it  into  the  dogmatic  of  the  church,  and  developed  it 
still  further."  There  is  no  doubt  of  the  profound  influence  of  the 
Plotinian  school  upon  Aqgustine.  But  whether  he  ever  read  the 
writings  of  Plotinus  himself,  either  in  the  original  Greek  or  in  a 
Latin  translation  is  not  so  clear.  The  only  authority  for  Har- 
nack's  assertion,  that  I  am  aware  of,  is  what  Augustine  tells  us 
in  his  Confessions  (viii.  2),  viz. :  that  he  "  had  read  certain  books 
of  the  Platonists  which  Victorinus  had  translated  into  Latin." 
Whether  the  writings  of  Plotinus  were  included  among  "  certain 
books  of  the  Platonists  "  is  perhaps  probable,  but  it  is  not  by 
any  means  certain.  There  is  no  direct  evidence  of  it  in  Augus- 
tine's own  writings,  beyond  the  passage  given  above.  Dr.  Schaff 
says  (History  of  the  Christian  Church,  vol.  iii.  p.  1001)  :  "  It  is 
probable  that  he  read  Plotinus  in  Greek ;  "  but  he  gives  no  good 
grounds  for  his  opinion,  and  when  one  considers  how  ignorant 
Augustine  was,  by  his  own  confession,  of  Greek,  and  also  how 
difficult  it  is  to  read  the  Greek  of  Plotinus,  one  is  compelled  to 
reject  it  as  wholly  improbable.  Dr.  Schaff  seems  to  rely  on  a 
quotation  which  Augustine  makes  from  the  Oracles  of  Porphyry. 
But  the  quotation  is  in  Latin,  and  Augustine  does  not  tell  us 
whose  translation  it  is.  Was  it  his  own  ?  I  do  not  think  so.  If 
Augustine  could  read  Greek  as  easily  as  that,  why  did  he  ask 
Jerome  to  translate  the  writings  of  Origen  for  him  ?  The  truth 
is  that  Augustine  made  scarcely  any  use  of  the  Greek  writings, 
even  the  Greek  Testament,  for  the  simple  reason  that  he  was 
too  ignorant  of  Greek  to  do  so.  His  acquaintance  with  Greek 
philosophy  and  theology  was  gained  at  second  hand.  Here  can 
be  clearly  traced  the  influence  of  Cicero.  In  the  City  of  God 
Cicero  is  quoted  more  than  twenty  times,  and  referred  to  fre- 
quently. It  was  from  this  source  that  Augustine  acquired  much 
of  his  knowledge  of  Plato.  Cicero  was  an  admirer  of  Plato,  call- 
ing him  quemdam  Deum  Philosophorum  (De  Natura  Deorum,  ii. 


90  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

God  and  of  Trinity  breathes  the  same  pantheistic 
strain.  Plotinus  declares  that  the  Deity,  though 
one  essence,  exists  by  a  process  of  evolution  in 
three  hypostases,  which  have  indeed  a  shadowy 
sort  of  personality,  and  yet  plainly  are  not  regarded 
by  him  as  distinct  personal  beings.  Personality, 
with  him,  comes  at  a  lower  stage  of  evolution,  as, 
for  example,  in  human  souls,  which  being  unsepa- 
rated  portions  of  the  "  one  "  or  "  all "  in  the  pre- 
natal state  of  existence,  become  personalized  in 
this  present  life  when  united  with  bodies.  The 
thorough  pantheism  of  Plotinus  made  it  easy  for 
him  to  adopt  the  theory  of  "  three  hypostases," 
as  a  stage  of  evolution  between  unity  and  multi- 
plicity, without  assuming  that  they  are  really  per- 
sonal. He  had  no  doctrine  of  a  personal  God,  in 
the  strict  theistic  sense.  Personality  for  him  is 
only  a  temporary  phase  of  pluralized  being  out 
of  the  absolute  unity.  Augustine  was  held  back 
from  such  a  position  by  his  theistic  Christian  faith, 
and  so  refused  to  say  that  the  one  God  exists  in 
three  real  hypostases,  which,  in  Christian  trinita- 
rian  language,  meant    three  individual    persons. 

12),  and  it  was  his  aim,  as  he  said,  "  to  array  Plato  in  Latin 
dress."  Li  a  very  scholarly  article  in  Smith's  Dictionary  of 
Christian  Biography,  written  by  Canon  Charles  Gore,  the  thor- 
oughly New  Platonic  character  of  the  Christian  writings  of  Vic- 
torinus  is  clearly  brought  out,  and  also  the  probable  influence  of 
them  on  Augustine.  This  is  shown  by  the  close  affinities  to  be 
seen  in  the  leading  doctrines  held  by  both  writers.  We  may  well 
believe,  therefore,  that,  if  Augustine  did  not  read  Plotinus  him- 
self, he  at  all  events  drank  deeply  of  his  philosophy  through  the 
New  Platonic  translations  and  writings  of  Victorinus. 


AUGUSTINIANISM  91 

Thus  while  Plotinus  had  no  hesitation  in  saying 
"  three  hypostases,"  as  forms  of  the  evolution  of 
unity  into  plurality,  since  for  him  hypostasis,  as 
being,  did  not  necessarily  involve  individual  per- 
sonality, Augustine  cannot  refuse  to  allow  that 
being  and  personality  are  coincident  and  involve 
each  other,  so  that,  if  God  is  one  as  a  being,  he 
must  also  be  one  as  a  person,  and  vice  versa,  that 
if  there  are  three  individual  persons  in  Deity,  there 
must  also  be  three  essences  or  personal  beings. 
Such  was  the  dilemma  in  which  Augustine  found 
himself  between  his  Christian  belief  and  his  phi- 
losophical system.  The  result  was  that  he  took 
refuge  in  the  plea  of  ignorance  and  mystery.  But 
his  real  metaphysical  doctrine  is  plainly  Plotinian. 
He  refuses  to  say  three  hypostases  or  real  persons, 
but  contents  himself  with  "  three  somewhats,"  and 
then,  when  asked  "  What  three,"  answers :  "  Three 
persons,  lest  we  should  seem  to  be  silent."  But 
are  the  "  three  somewhats  "  distinct  hypostases  or 
individual  beings  ?  Augustine  never  says  Yes, 
for  he  could  not  and  remain  Plotinian  as  he  was. 
The  result  is  that  his  Trinitarianism  is  monistic 
like  that  of  Plotinus  himself.  His  Trinity  is  not 
tripersonal,  and  hence  must  be,  in  spite  of  himself, 
imipersonal,  unless  he  drops  into  the  open  pit  of 
extreme  pantheism  and  makes  God  a  mere  t6  ov, 
unconscious  of  himself  or  of  the  world  that  is 
evolved  from  Him.  It  is  on  such  a  foundation  of 
pantheistic  philosophy,  from  which,  however,  he 
shrinks  back,  that  Augustine  builds  his  new  Trini- 


92  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tarianism  and  is  able  to  say  that  the  one  only  true 
God  and  the  Trinity  are  absolutely  the  same.  This 
is  not  monotheism ;  it  is  a  pantheistic  monism. 
The  great  difficulty  with  Augustine  was  that  he 
did  not  know  what  to  do  with  the  problem  of  per- 
sonality. He  plays  fast  and  loose  with  it,  and 
vibrates  between  theism  and  pantheism,  and  thus 
paves  the  way  for  the  amazing  assumption  of  some 
of  his  followers  in  later  times,  that  in  God  essence 
and  person  are  not  coincident,  so  that  God  may  be 
and  is  one  Being  and  yet  three  real  persons, — 
an  assumption  that  breaks  down  at  once  when 
submitted  to  the  test  of  reason. 

A  third  effect  of  the  new  mode  of  conceiving 
the  Trinity  remains  to  be  mentioned,  —  the  chan- 
ging of  the  Athanasian  homoousianism  from 
generic  to  numerical  unity  of  essence.  It  is  only 
needful  here  to  mark  the  fact  that  this  change 
resulted  from  Augustine's  entire  misconception  of 
the  Platonico-Aristotelian  nomenclature  of  Atha- 
nasius  and  the  other  Greek  theologians.  He  read 
the  Nicene  creed  through  New-Platonic  glasses, 
turning  its  three  personal  beings  metaphysically 
united  in  a  Platonic  universal  into  one  being  mani- 
fested under  three  modes  of  personal  existence. 
The  result  was  a  complete  overturn  of  the  Nicene 
doctrine.  Its  apex  became  its  base.  Trinity 
became  unity.  Trinitarianism  became  tri-unita- 
rianism.  The  foundation  was  thus  laid  for  the  new 
metaphysics  of  the  Divine  Being  to  which  I  have 
just  referred,  viz.,  that  God  is  one  Being,  while 


AUGUSTINIANISM  ©3 

three  persons.  Augustine  himself  was  not  ready 
to  make  the  jump.  He  simply  raised  the  problem 
and  left  it  unsolved.  But  his  followers  were 
bolder  than  he.  God  is  numerically  one  in  essence, 
yet  is  three  in  personal  agency ;  therefore  essence 
and  person  in  God  are  not  coincident.  Already 
this  step  was  taken  when  the  Pseudo-Athanasian 
creed  was  framed.  This  creed,  which  is  clearly  a 
product  of  the  Augustinian  school,  declares  that 
"  We  worship  one  God  in  trinity,  and  trinity  in 
unity,  neither  confounding  the  persons,  nor  divid- 
ing the  substance."  This  language  assumes  that 
the  substance  or  Being  is  one,  while  the  persons 
are  three.  But  does  the  creed  hold  to  three  real 
persons?  Plainly  not.  It  plays  with  the  term 
"  person,"  as  Augustine  did.  Its  doctrine,  under 
all  its  verbal  antinomies,  is  that  of  the  essential  Di- 
vine unity.  God,  it  declares,  is  unus  Deus,  that  is, 
one  personal  Being.  This  creed  has  recently  been 
charged  with  tritheism.  In  fact  its  position  is  at 
the  opposite  pole.  "There  are  not  tliree  Gods, 
but  one  God."  True,  its  Sabellianism  is  veiled 
under  the  assumption  that  God  may  be  one  Being 
and  yet  be  tliree  persons,  but  its  real  position  is 
that  God  is  one  Being,  whatever  explanation  be 
given  of  the  three  persons.  Thus  its  Trinitarianism 
is  only  a  disguise.  Its  hands  indeed  are  those  of 
Esau,  but  its  voice  is  the  voice  of  Jacob.  The 
doctrine  of  numerical  unity  of  essence  is  monistic, 
not  tritheistic,  and  the  subsequent  history  will  show 
that  the  New  Platonic  leaven  of  the  Augustinian 


94  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Trinitarianism  has  given  a  monistic  and  pantheistic 
direction  to  trinitarian  dogma  down  to  the  present 
day. 

To  pass  from  Augustine  to  the  later  history  of 
Trinitarianism  is  like  leaving  the  intricate  mazes 
of  some  difficult  strait  for  the  open  sea.  The  story 
to  be  told  is  simple  and  plain.  As  the  Dark  Ages 
come  on  apace,  theology  becomes  subject  to  tradi- 
tion and  ecclesiastical  authority.  Greek  literature 
is  buried ;  the  Greek  Fathers  are  no  longer  known 
or  read,  and  Augustine's  name  is  in  the  ascendant 
without  a  rival  for  a  thousand  years.  The  mediae- 
val Catholic  theology,  which  was  slowly  developed 
by  Anselm,  Thomas  Aquinas,  and  the  other  great 
Schoolmen,  is  simply  Augustinianism  reduced  to 
scholastic  form.  There  were  a  few  dissenting 
voices,  such  as  Roscelin  and  Joachim.  But  they 
were  quickly  reduced  to  silence  by  papal  synods. 
All  the  rest  sing  the  same  Augustinian  song. 
Anselm  may  speak  for  them.  "  Although  necessity 
compels  that  there  be  two,  still  it  cannot  in  any 
way  be  expressed  what  two  they  are  "  (jgiuid  duo 
sint^  ;  and  again,  "  one  essence,  yet  a  trinity,  on 
account  of  three  /  know  not  what "  (tres  nescio 
quid').  It  is  noticeable  that  in  these  passages 
Anselm  refuses  to  use  the  term  "  person,"  though 
it  is  still  employed  by  Augustinians  generally,  with 
the  express  understanding,  however,  that  it  is  in  a 
negative  or  relative  sense.  The  great  question 
with  the  Schoolmen  was  whether  the  Trinity  is 
one  being  (una  res)  or  three  beings  (tres  res). 


AUGUSTINIANISM  95 

Roscelin  held  that  three  real  persons  involved 
three  real  beings  (tres  res).  This  was  allowed  by 
Anselm,  who  accepted,  with  Augustine,  the  princi- 
ple that  nature  and  person  are  coincident;  and 
hence  he  denied  that  there  are  three  real  persons 
in  the  Trinity.  "  As  God  is  one  in  substance,  He 
cannot  be  several  persons  (ita  nee  plures  per- 
sonce),^^  Hence  his  frank  confession,  "  tres  nescio 
quid" 

It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  the  Protestant  Ee- 
f  ormation  only  increased  the  prestige  of  Augustine, 
the  great  Catholic  Father,  as  he  had  now  become. 
Catholics  and  Protestants  alike  appealed  to  him. 
The  question  of  the  Trinity  was  not  a  subject  of 
controversy,  and  the  Augustinian  form  of  trinitar 
rian  doctrine  became  a  fixed  tradition.  The  Nicene 
creed,  as  interpreted  by  the  Pseudo-Athanasian 
creed,  was  accepted  on  all  sides  and  passed  into  all 
the  Protestant  confessions.  It  is  to  be  noted  that 
Calvin  insisted  on  the  use  of  the  term  "  person  " 
as  the  only  word  that  would  unmask  SabeUianism. 
He  also  held  to  numerical  unity  of  essence.  This 
would  seem  to  indicate  that  Calvin  believed  that 
God  was  one  Being  in  three  real  persons,  and  if 
so,  he  must  have  allowed  that  in  God  nature  and 
person  are  not  coincident.  Yet  he  nowhere  raises 
the  question,  and  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  he 
was  not  conscious  of  any  departure  from  the  views 
of  Augustine.  But  it  was  inevitable,  under  the 
increased  light  and  freedom  of  Protestantism,  that 
questioning   should   arise.     The   creeds,   whether 


96  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Lutheran,  Calvinistic  or  Anglican,  described  the 
Trinity  as  three  persons.  What  did  they  mean  ? 
Are  the  three  persons  three  Beings  or  only  three 
modes  of  existence  of  one  Being  ?  It  was  the  old 
question  between  trinitarian  and  monarchian  in  the 
second  century,  and  it  would  not  down. 

We  have  thus  reached  the  historical  close  of  the 
undisturbed  reign  of  the  Pseudo-Athanasian  Au- 
gustinianism.  A  further  survey  of  the  discussions 
that  now  arose,  and  their  outcome  in  the  New 
England  Trinitarianism,  will  be  given  in  the  next 
chapter. 


CHAPTER  III 

NEW   ENGLAND   TRINITARIANISM 

The  history  of  the  evolution  of  the  Christian 
trinitarian  dogma  naturally  falls  into  three  divi- 
sions. The  first  includes  the  development  of  the 
Greek  Athanasian  doctrine,  viz.,  that  the  Trinity 
is  composed  of  three  distinct  personal  beings,  of 
whom  the  First  Person,  or  the  Father,  is  alone 
self-existent  and  absolute  God,  the  second  and 
third  persons  being  derived  and  subordinate,  the 
one  by  eternal  generation,  the  other  by  eternal 
procession.  The  second  division  gives  the  history 
of  the  later  Latin  Trinitarianism  as  moulded  by 
Augustine,  which  inverted  the  Greek  doctrine,  and 
held  that  each  person  is  Absolute  God,  and  that 
the  whole  Trinity  is  involved  in  each  person,  thus 
eliminating  aU  subordination,  making  the  Trinity 
essentially  one  Being,  and  reducing  the  three  per- 
sons to  relations  or  modes  of  existence  of  that 
Being. 

But  while  the  Augustinian  form  of  doctrine 
became  fixed  in  the  faith  of  the  Western  Church 
through  the  Middle  Ages,  the  Greek  Nicene  creed 
continued  to  be  accepted,  with  the  Jllioque  addition, 
without  any  suspicion  that  the  Athanasian  and 


98  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Augustinian  statements  were  in  diametrical  opposi- 
tion to  eacli  other  and  based  on  antagonistic  philo- 
sophies. The  Quicunque  vult,  a  Latin  creed  that 
originated  in  the  school  of  Augustine,  was  even 
attributed  to  Athanasius,  and  its  spuriousness  was 
not  suspected  until  the  revival  of  learning  was  in 
full  sweep  in  the  fifteenth  century.  Even  then  the 
true  meaning  of  the  discovery  was  not  clearly  dis- 
cerned. The  yoke  of  church  authority  stiU  weighed 
heavily  on  the  intellects  of  men  and  forbade  a  full 
use  of  the  light  gained.  The  Protestant  Eef  ormers 
were  too  busily  engaged  in  breaking  the  bonds  of 
papal  despotism  in  church  and  state  to  pay  much 
attention  to  speculative  questions,  and  the  old 
creeds  were  left  untouched.  But  as  the  movement 
proceeded,  and  its  real  significance  became  more 
fully  understood,  especially  when  the  rights  of  in- 
dividual intellectual  freedom  came  to  be  asserted, 
a  new  theological  movement  was  precipitated.  Then 
the  old  creeds  were  subjected  to  criticism,  and  the 
era  of  Protestant  symbolics  began.  We  are  thus 
brought  to  the  third  division  of  the  subject,  viz., 
the  period  of  questioning  and  controversy  as  to  the 
real  meaning  of  the  creeds,  and  as  to  the  truth  of 
the  historical  and  speculative  assumptions  in- 
volved in  them,  I  propose  in  the  present  chapter 
to  consider  the  discussions  that  arose  in  England, 
and  their  outcome  in  the  New  England  Trinitari- 
anism. 

These  discussions  began  with  the  publication  of 
Firmin's  "  Tracts  "  in  the  latter  part  of  the  seven- 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM  99 

teenth  century.  The  position  of  the  "  Tracts  "  was 
that  "  the  unity  of  God  is  a  unity  of  person  as  well 
as  of  nature,"  and  that  God  being  unipersonal 
"cannot  be  three  persons  any  more  than  a  man 
can  be  three  persons."  Sherlock  in  reply  accepted 
the  premises  of  Firmin,  as  to  unity  of  person  and 
nature,  but  drew  the  opposite  conclusion ;  that  the 
three  persons  are  three  distinct  minds  or  beings. 
But  this  position  was  wholly  opposed  to  the  Au- 
gustinian  monism  that  had  so  long  ruled  theology ; 
it  smacked  of  tritheism,  a  charge  to  which  Trinita- 
rians had  always  been  sensitive.  Had  the  English 
theologians  been  thoroughly  acquainted  with  Greek 
theology,  they  would  have  had  the  key  to  the  Atha- 
nasian  answer,  but  this  key  was  wanting  to  them. 
Augustinian  agnosticism  was  their  only  refuge. 
Wallis,  Jane,  South,  Howe,  Burnet,  all,  in  one 
chorus,  proclaim  that  the  three  are  not  real  persons 
in  the  ordinary  sense  of  persons.  Wallis  says  there 
are  three  "  somewhats,"  borrowing  the  word  from 
Augustine  himself.  Bishop  Burnet  prefers  to  speak 
of  the  Trinity  as  "  the  Blessed  Three,"  though  he 
would  not  object  to  the  word  "  person  "  if  he  could 
be  sure  it  would  be  understood  as  he  intended  it. 
This  closed  the  discussion  for  the  time,  but  it  broke 
out  again  in  what  is  called  the  Arian  controversy, 
in  the  early  part  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The 
Arians,  Samuel  Clarke  and  others,  took  the  same 
essential  ground  with  Firmin,  that  God  is  uniper- 
sonal, and  hence  that  the  Son  is  a  distinct  personal 
being,  distinguishing  God  the  Father  as  the  abso- 


.\tV 


100        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

lute  Deity  from  the  Son  whom  they  regarded  as 
God  in  a  relative  or  secondary  sense,  being  derived 
from  the  Father  and  having  his  beginning  from 
Him. 

The  most  notable  reply  was  that  of  Waterland. 
His  trinitarian  writings  have  usually  been  regarded 
by  his  school  of  theologians  as  the  most  consum- 
mate and  unanswerable  defense  of  orthodoxy  that 
has  ever  been  made.  But  there  is  nothing  really 
new  in  it,  except  that  it  loyally  accepts  the  term 
"  person  "  in  the  creeds  as  having  a  real  signifi- 
cance, and  hence  squarely  faces  and  accepts  under 
stress  the  metaphysical  paradox  involved  :  that  in 
God  nature  and  person  are  not  coincident.  On 
this  point  Waterland  started  a  new  current  of  trin- 
itarian dogma.  He  held,  against  the  Arians, 
that  Christ  is  the  Supreme  God,  a  distinct  person 
indeed  from  the  Father,  but  not  a  distinct  Being. 
To  support  this  he  allows  that  being  is  not  neces- 
sarily "  synonymous  with  person.'*  Yet  he  refuses 
to  take  a  decided  stand  on  this  point,  declaring  it 
to  be  a  "  question  about  a  name  or  a  phrase,  and 
a  scholastic  question  invented  in  later  times," 
which  shows  to  how  little  purpose  he  had  read 
church  history.  The  allied  question  of  numerical 
unity  of  essence  which,  as  we  have  seen,  lies  at 
the  basis  of  this  one  and  necessitates  it,  if  three 
real  persons  in  one  numerical  essence  are  insisted 
on,  he  also  declines  to  discuss,  declaring  that  the 
subject  is  beyond  us.  "  You  can  never  fix  any 
certain  principle  of   individuation;  in  short,  you 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        101 

know  not  precisely  what  it  is  that  makes  one 
being  or  essence."  If  so,  what  becomes  of  the 
whole  metaphysics  of  the  Nicene  Orthodox  Trinity, 
and  why  this  excited  controversy?  After  all, 
Waterland  falls  back  on  the  trinitarian  tradition. 
His  "  three  real  persons  "  are  not  individuals.  It 
is  the  old  modalistic  monism  disguised.  His  view 
of  the  Trinity  is  Augustinian.  "  The  Lord  our 
God  is  one  God,"  does  not  mean,  he  says,  "unity 
of  person."  It  may  mean  God  the  Father,  but 
"  not  exclusive  of  the  other  two  persons."  "  In 
strictness  the  one  God  is  the  whole  Trinity." 
"The  word  God  may  sometimes  signify  all  the 
divine  persons,  sometimes  any  person  of  the  three 
indefinitely  without  determining  which,  and  some- 
times one  particular  person,  Father,  Son,  or  Holy 
Ghost."  This  is  pure  Augustinianism,  and  shows 
that  Waterland  had  not  advanced  a  single  step  in 
the  way  of  theological  progress.  His  whole  spirit 
and  method  are  traditional. 

In  truth  Protestantism  in  the  seventeenth  and 
eighteenth  centuries  had  become  reactionary  and 
dogmatic.  Its  own  cardinal  principle  of  individ- 
ual freedom  of  belief  had  been  lost  sight  of,  or 
rather  it  had  never  yet  been  clearly  understood. 
Waterland  gives  little  evidence  of  acquaintance 
with  Greek  philosophy  or  theology.  His  studies 
were  confined  to  the  Latin  Fathers.  He  quoted 
Augustine  to  interpret  or  defend  what  he  supposed 
to  be  the  Nicene  doctrine.  The  revival  of  Greek 
studies  was  indeed  beginning  to  bear  fruit.     Such 


102        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

men  as  Hooker,  the  pride  of  English  Churchmen, 
Petavius,  the  learned  and  candid  Jesuit,  and  Cud- 
worth,  the  Cambridge  Platonist,  were  reopening 
the  long-closed  fountains  of  Greek  theology,  in 
works  that  are  to-day  rich  and  fruitful  for  all 
scholars.  But  such  cloistered  voices  were  unheard 
in  this  age  of  noisy  logomachies.  The  ponderous 
works  of  Waterland  bore  away  the  honors  of  vic- 
tory, and  the  discussion  again  for  the  time  was 
closed.  Henceforth  the  "  stream  of  tendency  " 
is  all  one  way.  The  Augustinian  Sabellianism 
sweeps  on  resistlessly,  carrying  in  its  wake  Church- 
man and  Dissenter,  Calvinist  and  Armi^ian  alike, 
and  crosses  the  Atlantic  to  find  a  new  home  in 
New  England. 

A  good  illustration  of  this  period  is  seen  in 
Isaac  Watts,  whose  hymns  had  such  influence  in 
moulding  Enghsh  as  well  as  American  religious 
thought  and  devotion.  The  Trinitarianism  of 
Watts  was  a  curious  amalgam  of  Sabellianism  and 
Arianism.  "  Person,"  in  his  view,  "  as  applied  to 
the  Trinity  is  not  to  be  taken  in  the  full  common 
and  literal  sense  of  it."  "  The  Father,  the  Word 
and  the  Spirit,  are  so  far  distinct  as  to  lay  a  foun- 
dation for  the  Scripture  to  speak  of  them  in  a 
personal  manner,  as  I,  Thou,  and  He,  and  upon 
this  account  they  are  called  three  persons,  but 
they  are  not  so  distinct  as  to  have  three  distinct 
consciousnesses."  Watts  well  illustrates  the  gen- 
eral demoralization  into  which  Calvinistic  ortho- 
doxy was  now  falling.     He  doubted  whether  the 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        103 

Holy  Spirit  was  anytliing  more  than  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  Divine  principle  "  in  a  personal 
manner,"  "  as  the  spirit  of  a  man  does  not  imply 
another  being."  Watts  was  an  Arian  in  his  view 
of  Christ,  holding  to  "  the  preexistence  of  Christ's 
human  soul,"  and  to  its  union  with  the  immanent 
Eternal  Logos  "  before  the  world  was."  He  also 
speculated  concerning  the  condition  of  infants, 
suggesting  that  they  were  annihilated,  in  case 
they  died  before  the  development  of  moral  agency. 
But  none  of  Watts's  peculiar  views  appear  in  his 
hymns,  which  breathe  the  hallowed  air  of  tradi- 
tional Calvinism. 

The  earliest  theological  divisions  in  New  Eng- 
land grew  out  of  questions  connected  with  the 
prevalence  of  Arminianism.  The  subject  of  the 
Trinity  was  in  the  background.  The  Westmin- 
ster catechism,  with  its  bald  trinitarian  statement, 
was  universally  accepted  and  made  the  text-book 
of  Christian  doctrine.  But  the  theologizing  ten- 
dencies that  so  profoundly  stirred  our  New  Eng- 
land forefathers  could  not  long  permit  the  trini- 
tarian dogma  to  remain  untouched.  Edwards 
seems  to  have  given  it  little  special  attention  ;  but 
incidental  statements  show  that,  wliile  he  was  will- 
ing to  use  the  term  "  person,"  he  was  not  quite 
clear  as  to  its  real  meaning  when  applied  to  God. 
Hopkins  deals  with  the  subject  more  at  length. 
His  views  are  a  curious  mixture  of  Latin  and 
Greek  elements.  He  held  to  the  real  eternal  gen- 
eration of  the  Son,  thus  far  agreeing  with  Athana- 


104        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

sius ;  but  his  doctrine  as  a  whole  is  Augustinian. 
God  is  "  the  infinite  three-one."  Jehovah  in  the 
Old  Testament  is  the  whole  Trinity.  Christ  is 
identified  with  Jehovah.  The  centre  of  his  per- 
sonality is  divine,  not  human.  Person  in  the 
Trinity  "  cannot  be  defined  so  as  to  give  a  clear 
adequate  idea."  Thus  the  Trinitarianism  of  Hop- 
kins hangs  on  the  horns  of  a  dilemma.  He  held 
the  absolute  Deity  of  Christ,  and  denied  all  sub- 
ordination, and  yet  insisted  on  his  real  generation 
from  the  Father.  The  contradiction  here  involved 
is  apparent  at  once.  Real  generation  supposes  de- 
rivation, and  consequent  subordination.  Hence 
Athanasius  was  a  consistent  subordinationist  to 
the  last.  Augustinianism  and  Athanasianism  can- 
not be  harmonized.  Hopkins  does  not  seem  to 
have  been  conscious  of  the  difficulty.  But  Em- 
mons, his  greater  disciple,  saw  and  avoided  it. 
He  cut  the  Gordian  knot  in  true  Alexandrian 
fashion,  declaring  that  "  eternal  generation  is 
eternal  nonsense."  Emmons  was  a  keen  logician  ; 
he  also  had  the  gift  of  a  terse  and  lucid  theologi- 
cal style.  No  theologian  since  Edwards  can  be 
compared  with  him  in  these  respects.  Accept  his 
assumptions  and  one  is  driven  on  irresistibly  to 
the  most  radical  conclusions.  But  his  theology 
is  essentially  metaphysical.^     With  the  rest  of  his 

1  The  metaphysical  system  of  Emmons  is  one  of  the  marvels 
of  historical  theology.  The  links  of  minor  premise  and  conclu- 
sion are  forged  with  a  consummate  syllogistical  skill,  while  the 
most  amazing  major  premises,  on  which  the  whole  theological 
edifice  stands,  are  assumed  with  an  ease  and  assurance  that  is 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        105 

age  he  was  wholly  lacking  in  the  historical  and 
critical  spirit.  What  Athanasius  and  the  Greek 
Fathers  taught  had  no  interest  for  him.  He  dealt 
with  the  Trinity  from  the  standpoint  of  the  logi- 
cal reason.  "  Eternal  generation  "  is,  he  thought, 
rationally  inconceivable,  a  mere  cobweb  of  the 
speculative  imagination,  and  he  brushed  it  away 
as  impatiently  as  did  Arius  himself.  Thus  was 
extinguished  the  last  trace  of  genuine  Athanasian- 
ism  in  New  England  theology.  A  new  era  now 
began,  and  Emmons  was  its  prophet.  He  was  the 
real  founder  of  the  New  England  trinitarian 
school. 

Three  points  form  the  basis  of  the  Trinitarianism 
of  Emmons.  (1.)  He  holds  tenaciously  to  three 
real  persons.  "  It  is  as  easy,"  he  declares,  "  to 
conceive  of  God  existing  in  three  persons  as  in 
one  person."  This  language  shows  that  Emmons 
employed  the  term  "  person  "  in  the  strict  literal 
sense.  (2.)  He  holds  that  the  three  persons  are 
absolutely  equal,  and  further  are  numerically  one 
Being.  This  involves  the  metaphysical  assumption 
that  in  the  Trinity  being  and  person  are  not  coin- 
cident. Enunons  takes  this  position  without  any 
evasions ;  and  he  is  the  first  theologian  that  I  am 

simply  incompreliensible  in  these  later  days  -when  the  indnctive 
and  critical  process  has  made  individual  facts  rather  than  general 
ideas  the  basis  of  knowledge.  Professor  Talcott  has  informed 
me  that  Emmons  once  said  to  him  :  "  There  are  no  chasms  in  my 
theology  any  more  than  in  this  floor,"  pointing  downward.  I  am 
not  disposed  to  question  the  assertion.  The  real  chasm  \a  not  in 
the  system  but  behind  it.    It  is  built  on  a  metaphysical  vacuum. 


106        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

aware  of  in  the  history  of  the  doctrine  who  does 
so.  As  I  have  abeady  noted,  the  Pseudo-Athana- 
sian  creed  assumes  it  implicitly,  but  not  explicitly. 
Waterland  asserts  that  it  may  be  so,  but  refuses 
to  make  an  issue  of  it,  and  falls  back  on  the  posi- 
tion that  person  has  an  unknown  meaning.  The 
language  of  Hopkins  also  implies  it,  but  it  was 
reserved  for  so  bold  and  speculative  a  thinker  as 
Emmons  to  assert  that  though  we  cannot  conceive 
that  three  persons  should  he  one  person^  we  may 
conceive  that  three  persons  should  he  one  Being^ 
"  if  we  only  suppose  that  being  may  signify  some- 
thing different  from  person  in  respect  to  Deity." 
This  whoUy  improbable  supposition  Emmons  forth- 
with characteristically  assumes  as  fact.  (3.)  Em- 
mons gave  prominence  to  the  theory  of  "  official 
subordination."  "  The  name  Father  is  taken  from 
the  peculiar  office  which  he  sustains  in  the  economy 
of  redemption.  The  second  person  assumes  the 
name  of  Son  and  Word  by  virtue  of  his  incarna- 
tion." In  this  very  statement  lurks  the  Sabellian- 
izing  leaven  which  one  day  will  leaven  the  whole 
lump.  Father  and  Son  are  "  names  "  "  assumed  " 
to  set  forth  certain  activities  of  the  one  Absolute 
God.  This  is  essential  SabeUianism  at  the  start. 
But  Emmons  goes  farther.  He  had  cast  aside  the 
doctrine  of  the  eternal  generation  of  the  Son,  but 
now  he  suggests  that  the  names  Son  and  Word 
had  no  existence  before  the  incarnation.  "  They 
were  probably  unknown  in  heaven  until  the  pur- 
poses of  grace  were  there  revealed."     But  if  the 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        107 

names  Word  and  Son  were  unknown  before  the 
incarnation,  how  about  the  real  personality  of  the 
second  person  of  the  Trinity  ?  Did  the  Son  exist 
personally  before  the  incarnation  without  a  name, 
or  does  the  want  of  a  name  imply  the  non-existence 
of  the  reality  ?  Emmons  halts  at  this  point,  but 
his  followers,  Stuart  and  others,  will  take  up  the 
pregnant  suggestion  that  he  had  dropped  so  care- 
lessly, with  what  result  we  shall  see. 

Such  assumptions  as  Emmons  had  employed  on 
which  to  build  his  trinitarian  system  could  not 
long  pass  without  question.  We  come  to  the  so- 
called  Unitarian  Controversy,  which  has  left  its 
mark  on  the  whole  further  history  of  New  Eng- 
land theological  thought.  It  broke  out  in  conse- 
quence of  a  sermon  by  Channing  in  1819,  in  which 
he  impugned  the  orthodox  trinitarian  doctrine  as 
illogical  and  unscriptural.  His  position  was  that 
three  persons  imply  "  three  intelligent  agents  pos- 
sessed of  different  consciousnesses,  different  wills, 
and  different  perceptions,"  and  that  these  distinct 
attributes  constitute  "three  minds  or  beings," 
—  the  old  admission  of  Sherlock.  Moreover,  he 
declared  that  the  New  Testament  statements 
concerning  the  Father  and  Son  involve  distinct 
and  separate  personality.  Channing  himself  was 
substantially  an  Arian,  holding  that  Christ  was  a 
preexistent  and  divine  being,  but  dependent  and 
subordinate  to  the  Father  who  is  the  only  Su- 
preme Deity.  Moses  Stuart,  in  his  defense  of  the 
traditional   Trinitarianism,  refuses  to   accept  the 


108        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

term  "  person  "  as  a  proper  one  to  define  the  distinc- 
tions in  the  Trinity.  He  wishes  the  word  "  had 
never  come  into  the  symbols  of  the  churches."  "  I 
believe  in  a  threefold  distinction  in  the  Godhead, 
and  do  not  venture  to  make  any  attempt  at  expla- 
nation." It  is  to  be  noted  that  Stuart  makes  no 
use  of  the  metaphysics  of  Emmons,  who  squarely 
insisted  that  God  is  one  being  in  three  real  per- 
sons, and  that  in  God  essence  and  person  are  not 
coincident.  Stuart  rather  goes  back  to  the  agnos- 
ticism of  Augustine,  who  said  "  three  somewhats," 
and  of  Anselm,  who  said  "  three  I  know  not  what." 
He  had  been  anticipated  in  this  by  President 
Dwight,  who  declared  that  person  is  "strictly 
proper,"  but  did  "  not  know  its  exact  meaning." 
The  term  "  distinction  "  which  Stuart  substituted 
for  person  is  of  Sabellian  origin.  Calvin  saw  its 
real  character  and  pierced  it  with  one  of  the  keen- 
est shafts  of  his  wit.  It  came  into  use  in  New 
England  apparently  through  Watts;  but  Stuart 
made  it  current  coin,  and  from  his  day  to  the  pre- 
sent it  has  largely  usurped  the  place  of  person  in 
trinitarian  language.  "  A  threefold  distinction  in 
the  Godhead,"  which  is  aU  that  Stuart  dares  to 
say,  is  a  fit  legend  to  be  placed  at  the  head  of  the 
latest  chapter  in  the  history  of  New  England  Trini- 
tarianism.  It  is  a  suggestive  fact  that  the  Burial 
HiU  declaration,  and  the  so-caUed  Congregational 
creed  of  1883,  both  omit  the  word  "  person  "  from 
their  trinitarian  statements,  and  that  out  of  thirty- 
seven  church  creeds  that  I  have  been  able  to  ex- 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        109 

amine  only  five  employ  it.  Tliis  fact  by  itself 
illmninates  our  further  survey.  The  SabelHan 
leaven  of  Emmons  and  Stuart  did  its  work  thor- 
oughly, and  New  England  Trinitarianism  through 
all  its  veins  became  inoculated  with  its  virus.  Per- 
haps the  most  notable  fact  of  all  is  that  neither 
Emmons  nor  Stuart  was  conscious  of  any  Sabel- 
lianizing  tendency,  and  that  their  trinitarian  suc- 
cessors to-day  seem  equally  unconscious  of  it.  The 
self-complacent  assertion  so  frequently  made  that 
New  England  Trinitarianism  is  a  lineal  descendant 
of  Athanasius  and  the  Nicene  creed  vividly  illus- 
trates the  power  of  a  theological  tradition  even 
upon  critical  and  scholarly  minds.^ 

While  the  general  course  of  the  subsequent  his- 

1  No  historical  writer  has  more  clearly  discerned  the  true  char- 
acter of  the  later  New  England  Trinitarianism  than  Dr.  George 
P.  Fisher.  I  cannot  forbear  to  quote  an  extract  from  his  Dis- 
cussions in  History  and  Theology,  p.  273.  "  Hopkins  was  the 
last  to  hold  to  the  Nicene  doctrine  of  the  primacy  of  the  Father 
and  the  eternal  sonship  of  Christ.  The  whole  philosophy  of  the 
Trinity,  as  that  doctrine  was  conceived  by  its  great  defenders  in 
the  age  of  Athanasius,  when  the  doctrine  was  formulated,  had  been 
set  aside.  It  was  even  derided ;  and  this  chiefly  for  the  reason 
that  it  was  not  studied.  Professor  Stuart  had  no  sympathy  with, 
or  just  appreciation  of,  the  Nicene  doctrine  of  the  generation  of 
the  Son.  His  conscious  need  of  a  philosophy  on  the  subject  was 
shown  in  the  warm  though  cautious  and  qualified  welcome  which 
he  gave  to  the  Sabellianism  of  Schleiermacher.  What  he  de- 
fended against  Channing,  though  with  vigor  and  learning,  was 
the  notion  of  three  distinctions  to  which  personal  pronouns  can 
be  applied,  —  a  mode  of  defining  the  Trinity  which  the  Nicene 
Fathers  who  framed  the  orthodox  creed  would  have  regarded 
with  some  astonishment.  The  eternal  fatherhood  of  God,  the 
precedence  of  the  Father,  is  as  much  a  part  of  the  orthodox  doo- 
trine  of  the  Trinity  as  is  the  divinity  of  the  Son." 


110        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tory  is  clear,  there  are  yet  theological  windings 
and  cross-currents  which  make  our  further  survey 
complicated  and  difficult.  The  trinitarian  sect  be- 
came divided  into  various  tendencies  which  even- 
tually took  shape  in  distinct  schools  of  thought. 
My  present  purpose  is  simply  to  give  some  intel- 
ligible idea  of  the  chief  phases  of  the  general 
Sabellian  movement.  Four  such  phases  may  be 
distinguished. 

First,  the  modified  Sabellianism  of  Stuart  and 
Bushnell.  Stuart,  as  we  have  seen,  followed  in 
the  path  struck  out  by  Emmons.  In  his  discus- 
sion with  Channing  he  had  taken  simply  a  defen- 
sive attitude,  meeting  Channing's  metaphysics  in 
regard  to  three  persons  as  synonymous  with  three 
separate  beings  by  declaring  that  person  was  used 
by  Trinitarians  "  not  affirmatively  but  liegatively,'* 
that  is,  as  involving  distinctions  without  affirming 
what  these  distinctions  are.  At  this  point  the  dis- 
cussion closed ;  but,  some  years  after,  Stuart  trans- 
lated with  extensive  notes  an  essay  of  Schleier- 
macher  in  which  Schleiermacher  had  defended 
Sabellius  from  the  charge  of  Patripassianism  and 
interpreted  the  Sabellian  view  as  essentially  trini- 
tarian, though  distinguishing  a  trinity  developed 
in  time  from  a  trinity  eternally  immanent  in  the 
Divine  Being.  Schleiermacher  opposed  the  Nicene 
doctrine  of  eternal  generation,  holding  that  the 
Son  is  self-existent  and  independent,  that  is,  Ab- 
solute God,  and  that  the  Trinity  is  a  manifesta- 
tion of  the  one  God  in  different  modes  of  creating 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        111 

and  redeeming  activity.  No  two  names  are  more 
historically  incongruous  than  those  of  Schleier- 
macher  and  Emmons.  But  their  views  run  easily 
into  each  other;  and,  in  fact,  Schleiermacher's 
essay  only  fructified  in  Stuart's  mind  the  seed  that 
Emmons  had  already  sown.  Stuart's  voluminous 
notes  in  connection  with  his  translation  are  of 
great  value  to  any  one  who  would  completely  un- 
derstand the  further  history  of  New  England 
Trinitarianism.  Bushnell  confessed  his  obligation 
to  them. 

The  excitement  caused  by  Bushnell's  "  God  in 
Christ"  is  a  bygone  tale.  But  nothing  is  more 
curious  to-day  than  the  history  of  the  effort  to  con- 
vict Bushnell  of  Sabellian  and  Unitarian  heresy. 
The  only  peculiarity  of  his  famous  book  is  its 
Bushnellian  rhetoric  and  genius.  Its  christology 
is  borrowed  from  Schleiermacher  and  Stuart.  Yet 
Stuart  sat  secure  in  his  chair  at  Andover,  in  all 
the  odor  of  orthodoxy,  while  the  theological  air 
was  hot  with  accusations  against  his  eloquent  dis- 
ciple. In  fact  the  doctrine  of  both  was  thoroughly 
SabeUian,  though  a  modification  was  introduced 
which,  it  was  claimed,  changed  its  whole  character. 
SabeUianism  holds  to  the  eternal  immanent  uni- 
personality  of  God,  but  introduces  a  trinity  of  de- 
velopments of  God  in  time  for  purposes  of  Divine 
manifestation  in  creation  and  redemption.  These 
developments  are  in  personal  modes,  but  not  such 
as  constitute  three  personal  beings.  This  is  the 
doctrine  also  of  Stuart  and  Bushnell.     But  Stuart 


112        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

laid  hold  of  the  idea  of  Watts  and  Emmons  that 
there  is  "  laid  a  foundation  in  the  Divine  nature  " 
for  these  distinctions.  Bushnell  was  at  first  ag- 
nostic on  this  point,  though  later  he  tentatively 
accepts  it.  But  this  qualification  did  not  affect 
the  essential  Sabellianism  of  the  whole  doctrine. 
Stuart  and  Bushnell  both,  following  Schleier- 
macher,  declare  that  God  is  not  eternally  triper- 
sonal,  but  unipersonal.  The  Trinity  is  not  fully 
developed  until  the  incarnation.  Here  Stuart  takes 
up  the  suggestion  of  Emmons  that  the  names 
Word  and  Son  were  not  known  in  heaven  before 
the  birth  of  Christ,  which  implies  that  the  Trinity 
came  into  real  existence  with  this  event.  Stuart 
seems  at  times  to  hold  a  developed  trinity  of  real 
persons,  and  seeks  to  hide  his  Sabellianism  under 
this  cover.  But,  in  fact,  his  persons  are  not  real 
any  more  than  the  Sabellian  persons  are ;  they  are 
modes  of  personal  existence  of  the  One  Divine 
Being.  He  talks  about  the  Son's  personality,  but 
he  frankly  confesses  that  he  uses  person  "  to  desig- 
nate a  distinction  which  cannot  be  comprehended 
or  defined,  and  would  not  employ  it  if  it  had  never 
been  used.''  Personality  as  related  to  God  is  for 
Stuart  the  great  enigma,  as  it  was  for  Augustine. 
Accepting  "  a  numerical  unity  of  substance "  in 
the  Godhead,  he  declares  that  "  this  excludes  such 
personality  as  exists  among  men."  He  even  sug- 
gests that  personality  cannot  be  essential  to  divin- 
ity, —  a  pantheistic  idea  which  shows  whither  New 
England   Trinitarianism  was  pointing.      Stuart's 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        113 

doctrine  was  modalistic  and  he  frankly  allows  it, 
quoting  and  appropriating  Turretin's  phrase  "  mo- 
dal distinctions." 

One  great  merit,  however,  must  be  accorded  to 
Stuart.  He  was  a  Greek  scholar,  and  compre- 
hended the  true  character  of  the  Nicene  Trinita- 
rianism,  allowing  that  homoousios  in  the  Nicene 
creed  did  not  mean  numerical  unity,  and  that  its 
doctrine  was  essential  subordinationism,  and  on 
this  ground  rejecting  it.  Thus  Stuart,  in  his  in- 
terpretation of  the  Greek  theology,  placed  himself 
in  line  with  Petavius  and  Cudworth  and  antici- 
pated the  results  of  later  scholarship.  I  have 
styled  the  doctrine  of  the  Stuart-Bushnell  school 
a  modified  Sabellianism.  It  ought  to  be  said, 
however,  that  in  one  respect  they  differed  widely 
from  the  Sabellians  of  the  early  church.  These 
regarded  Christ  as  a  semi-divine  and  semi-human 
being  whose  personal  existence  would  end  at  the 
close  of  the  Christian  dispensation,  when  God 
would  be  all  in  all.  Stuart  on  the  other  hand 
made  Christ  the  incarnation  of  the  Absolute  God. 
"  The  Son,"  he  said,  "  is  avrd^cos."  Hence  his 
denial  of  eternal  generation  and  of  subordination. 
It  was  the  great  objection  of  Stuart  to  the  Nicene 
creed  that  it  made  the  Son  a  derived  and  depend- 
ent being,  and  so  broke  down,  as  he  declared,  his 
true  Deity.  But  Stuart  was  equally  afraid  of 
tritheism.  There  cannot  be  three  avroOeot.  One 
refuge  only  remained  for  him,  —  a  Sabellian  denial 
of  three  real  persons. 


114        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

The  second  phase  of  trinitarian  thought  to  be 
described  is  the  transcendental  modalism  of  H.  B. 
Smith,  Shedd,  and  Domer.  I  mention  Dorner 
because  he  represents  a  German  element  of  influ- 
ence which  profoundly  affected  this  whole  school, 
and  also  because  his  writings  have  been  widely 
read  in  New  England.  The  renaissance  of  Ger- 
man literature  first  made  itself  felt  philosophically 
and  theologically  on  this  side  the  ocean  through 
Unitarian  scholars  like  Hedge  and  Norton,  and  it 
leavened  the  transcendental  movement,  which 
found  its  great  prophet  in  Emerson.  But  the 
influence  of  Goethe,  Kant,  Schelling,  and  Hegel 
could  not  be  limited  to  a  sect.  It  entered  the 
ranks  of  the  so-called  Evangelicals.  H.  B.  Smith, 
who  may  be  selected  as  the  best  exponent  of  this 
second  phase  of  New  England  Trinitarianism,  spent 
several  years  in  a  German  university  and  drank 
deeply  at  the  springs  of  German  transcendental 
thought.  The  subjective  transcendental  character 
of  the  school  must  be  clearly  understood  in  order 
to  appreciate  the  peculiar  turn  given  by  them  to 
the  trinitarian  dogma.  It  explains  the  remarkable 
fact  that  though  they  laid  claim  to  historical  and 
exegetical  learning,  they  paid  scant  respect  to  the 
historical  and  Biblical  aspects  of  Christian  doc- 
trine. They  belonged  to  the  slowly  ebbing  tide 
of  an  intensely  metaphysical  age,  and  represent  a 
curious  mixture  of  New  England  Edwardsianism 
and  German  Hegelianism.  Hence  the  subjective 
deductive  method  rules  and  shapes  their  thinking. 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        115 

and  history  and  exegesis  are  twisted,  if  necessity 
arises,  into  harmony  with  their  metaphysical  as- 
sumptions. I  need  only  refer  for  illustration  to 
Dorner's  interpretation  of  the  Nicene  theology  in 
his  "  History  of  Christian  Doctrine,"  and  to  Shedd's 
interpretation  of  the  Augustinian  anthropology  in 
his  "  History  of  Christian  Doctrine,"  unreliable  as 
they  are  for  historical  or  critical  purposes,  and 
only  valuable  as  representing  their  own  theological 
opinions. 

This  school  was  thus  peculiarly  fitted  to  give  a 
new  impulse  to  the  waning  Augustinian  meta- 
physical method  of  treating  the  dogma  of  the 
Trinity.  They  started,  as  Augustine  himself  did, 
with  a  purely  metaphysical  assumption,  viz.,  the 
absoluteness  of  the  divine  unity.  "  God,"  says 
H.  B.  Smith,  "is  the  one  supreme  personality." 
Dorner  calls  Him  "the  Absolute  Personality." 
God  then  is  personal,  which  seems  to  avoid  pan- 
theism. But  is  He  unipersonal  ?  No,  his  person- 
ality is  tripersonal.  Is  He  then  one  Being  ?  Yes ; 
but  "  not  an  individual  like  a  man."  God  cannot 
in  his  essence  be  individualized.  But  can  He 
be  individualized  in  his  personal  form  of  being  ? 
Is  He  three  individual  Persons  ?  No  ;  for  this 
would  be  tritheism.  Can  God  then  be  defined  ? 
Not  clearly.  Smith  'says,  "  God  is  not  one  of  a 
class."  Yet  this  school  ventures  into  the  hidden 
depths  of  the  divine  nature  with  a  bold  and  firm 
step.  Smith  says,  "  God  is  triune."  Shedd  says. 
He  is  "  a  plural  unit."     But  what  do  these  terms 


116        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

mean  ?  Smith  answers,  —  and  Dorner  agrees 
with  him,  —  "  The  one  Supreme  Personality  ex- 
ists in  three  personal  modes  of  being,  but  is  not 
three  distinct  persons."  This  is  the  old  modalism 
which  constitutes  the  real  warp  and  woof  of  the 
whole  theory.  Note  the  remarkable  metaphysi- 
cal assumption  involved,  viz.,  that  personality  and 
person  in  God  are  different.  God  is  one  person- 
ality, hut  not  one  person.  But  how  can  this  be  ? 
Is  personality  here  used  in  an  abstract  sense? 
Then  God  is  not  one  concrete  Being,  and  panthe- 
ism again  confronts  us.  Or  is  He  one  concrete 
Being  and  also  personal,  then  He  must  be  uniper- 
sonal.  Such  is  the  metaphysical  puzzle  involved 
in  the  view  of  Smith  and  Dorner.  Shedd  explains 
his  "  plural  unit "  somewhat  differently,  but  comes 
to  a  similar  paradoxical  result.  God,  he  says,  is 
both  unipersonal  and  tripersonal,  that  is,  of  course, 
both  one  Person  and  three  Persons,  or,  mathemat- 
ically stated,  1  =  3.  But  what  is  the  real  doctrine 
that  lurks  under  this  strange  guise  ?  It  is  a  mo- 
dalistic  pantheistic  SabeUianism.  Let  Dorner  state 
it  in  his  own  German  way.  "  The  absolute  Per- 
sonality is  present  in  each  of  the  divine  distinc- 
tions in  such  a  way  that  though  they  are  not  of 
themselves  and  singly  personal^  they  have  a  share 
in  the  One  Divine  Personality,  in  their  own  man- 
ner." "  The  eternal  result  of  the  trmitarian  pro- 
cess is  the  eternal  presence  of  the  divine  Per- 
sonality in  different  modes  of  being."  Here  is 
modalism  and  SabeUianism  and  pantheism  in  one 
conglomerate. 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        117 

Lest  I  may  seem  to  be  unjust  in  my  statement, 
which  is  largely  in  the  very  language  of  these 
writers,  I  quote  a  passage  from  H.  B.  Smith.  He 
derides  the  doctrine  of  God  "  as  an  individual  be- 
ing "  as  "  Unitarian,"  "  Deistic  "  and  "  anthropo- 
morphic," and  adds :  "  God  is  the  supreme  intelli- 
gence, the  one  supreme  Personality  and  Causality, 
but  not  one  as  an  individual  in  the  sense  in  which 
one  man  is  an  individual."  But  the  doctrine  of 
God  "  as  an  individual  being  "  is  not  Deism,  it  is 
Theism,  the  doctrine  of  Plato  and  Athanasius; 
while  the  doctrine  of  the  Smith-Domer  school  is 
the  first  step  to  a  complete  pantheism.  The  ques- 
tion between  the  theist  and  the  pantheist  is  con- 
cerning the  nature  of  personality  as  related  to 
substance.  The  theist  holds  that  a  person  is  a 
single  self-conscious  being  with  its  own  substance. 
The  pantheist  holds  that  there  is  but  one  substance 
in  the  universe,  and  that  personality  is  an  accident 
or  quality  or  mode  of  existence  of  substance,  so 
that  there  may  be  and  in  fact  are  many  persons 
included  in  the  one  universal  substance  of  things. 
The  first  step  toward  such  a  pantheistic  result  is 
to  regard  the  three  persons  of  the  Trinity  as  per- 
sonal self-conscious  modes  of  existence  of  the  one 
absolute  seK-consciousness.  This  is  the  doctrine 
of  Smith  and  Dorner.  The  second  step  is  to 
resolve  every  individual  and  personal  seK-conscious- 
ness,  that  is,  every  personal  being,  into  a  mode  of 
the  absolute  self-consciousness.  The  final  step  is 
to  resolve  all  personality,  whether  individual  or 


il8  EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

absolute,  into  a  specialized  and  accidental  mode  of 
existence  of  the  one  eternal  absolute,  the  to  6v  of 
the  New  Platonists,  which  is  above  all  limitations, 
even  self -consciousness  itself,  —  the  doctrine  com- 
monly attributed  to  Spinoza.  Pantheism  can  go 
no  further  ;  and  the  road  to  it  is  straight.  When 
Augustine  declared  that  he  did  not  know  what  he 
meant  by  "  three  persons  "  in  the  Trinity,  he  left 
firm  theistic  groimd,  and  his  followers  have  ever 
since  been  moving  forward  toward  a  pantheistic 
end.  In  this  evolution  the  Smith-Dorner  school 
took  one  decisive  step.  It  brought  out  clearly  the 
metaphysical  pantheistic  premise  involved  in  the 
Augustinian  position,  though  it  struggled  hard  to 
preserve  the  appearance  of  a  theistic  Trinitarianism. 

But  the  air  of  this  transcendental  school  was 
too  rare  and  ethereal  for  common  minds.  The 
genius  of  its  leaders  gave  it  celebrity,  but  its  fol- 
lowers formed  only  a  coterie.  Its  refined  meta- 
physical distinctions  and  paradoxical  antitheses 
could  not  take  the  pla<3e  of  the  popular  theology. 
Trinitarian  faith  wavered  between  a  crude  trithe- 
ism  and  a  veiled  unitarianism.  Meanwhile  the 
new  age  of  historical  inquiry  had  fairly  dawned. 
The  Bible  became  a  subject  of  critical  study.  Tra- 
ditional orthodoxy  was  in  a  state  of  flux,  and  its 
ancient  theological  foundations  were  in  danger  of 
upheaval  and  ruin.  The  man  for  the  hour  was 
needed,  and  he  appeared,  as  was  supposed,  in  the 
person  of  Mr.  Joseph  Cook. 

This  brings  us  to  the  third  phase  of  the  later 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        119 

New  England  Trinitarianism,  marked  by  a  revival 
of  a  type  of  doctrine  which  comes  nearer  to  that 
of  Sabellius  himself  than  any  other  of  recent  times, 
and  of  which  Mr.  Joseph  Cook,  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott, 
and  Dr.  A.  H.  Bradford  may  be  selected  as  repre- 
sentatives. These  names  can  hardly  be  said  to 
form  a  school.  They  are  widely  apart  from  each 
other  in  many  respects.  I  link  them  together  be- 
cause of  their  essential  agreement  in  their  theories 
of  the  Trinity.  When  Mr.  Cook  delivered  his  three 
lectures  on  the  Trinity  in  1887  there  had  been  a 
long  lull  in  public  discussion,  and  the  supporters 
of  orthodoxy  were  quietly  waiting  for  the  next 
"  moving  of  the  waters."  For  Mr.  Cook  himself 
the  time  was  opportune.  He  was  at  the  zenith  of 
his  peculiar  reputation.  Boston  had  installed  him 
"  in  Moses'  seat."  The  orthodox  elite  of  Massa- 
chusetts sat  at  his  feet  and  hung  upon  his  lips. 
When  he  announced  his  theme  there  was  a  imiver- 
sal  hush  of  expectation  and  sympathy.  Truly  the 
opportunity  was  great.  But  unfortimately  Mr. 
Cook  was  not  properly  equipped  for  the  work 
he  took  in  hand.  His  genius  is  rhetorical,  not 
metaphysical.  Especially  was  he  lacking  in  the 
scholarship  which  such  a  discussion  required.  He 
was  seemingly  innocent  of  all  knowledge  of  the 
Greek  Fathers.  The  Latin  Pseudo-Athanasian 
creed  was  for  him  the  most  perfect  statement  of 
orthodoxy.  The  character  of  his  acquaintance 
with  ecclesiastical  Greek  is  shown  in  his  remarka- 
ble use  of  the  term  {nroaracrLs,  which  he  prefers  to 


120        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

person,  because,  as  lie  supposes,  it  means  less  than 
person;  whereas  Dr.  Shedd  rejected  it  for  the 
very  good  reason  that  it  cannot  mean  less  and  may 
mean  more.  Mr.  Cook  might  have  learned  some- 
thing from  Jerome,  who  was  afraid  to  use  the 
term  virooraa-Ls  for  persona,  as  the  Greeks  desired, 
because  it  seemed  to  involve  tritheism,  —  the  very 
thing  that  Mr.  Cook  so  feared.  But  no  man  can 
be  omniscient,  and  I  should  not  here  refer  to  Mr. 
Cook's  shortcomings  in  church  history  if  he  had 
not  boldly  entered  historical  ground  and  made 
statements  which  his  cultured  audience  accepted 
apparently  as  true  on  his  authority. 

Mr.  Cook's  aim  in  his  addresses  was  to  defend 
trinitarian  orthodoxy  as  he  understood  it.  He 
especially  proposed  to  exorcise  the  "  paganism,"  as 
he  called  it,  of  "  three  Gods."  To  this  end  he 
appealed  to  the  "  scientific  method."  But  it  must 
be  frankly  said  that  there  is  little  science  in  Mr. 
Cook's  discussion,  and  little  that  is  original,  saving 
always  his  remarkable  rhetoric.  After  giving  a 
definition  of  the  Trinity,  which  SabeUius  would 
have  found  no  fault  with,  he  introduces  an  old 
illustration  which  had  been  used  by  both  Trinitari- 
ans and  Unitarians  in  the  early  church,  but  with 
opposite  application,  —  that  of  the  sun  and  its 
rays.  There  is  nothing  new  in  the  illustration, 
but  the  use  made  of  it  by  Mr.  Cook  is  certainly 
original,  and  I  challenge  any  one  to  find  anything 
to  compare  with  it  in  the  history  of  trinitarian 
dogma.     To  be  appreciated,  it  must  be  read  in 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        121 

full ;  but  I  will  endeavor  to  give  a  clear  outline  of 
it.  "  Sunlight,  rainbow,  heat,  one  solar  radiance ; 
Father,  Son,  Holy  Ghost,  one  God.  As  the  rain- 
bow shows  what  light  is  when  unfolded,  so  Christ 
reveals  the  nature  of  God."  "  As  at  the  same  in- 
stant the  sunlight  is  itself  and  also  the  rainbow 
and  heat,  so  at  the  same  moment  Christ  is  both 
himseK  and  the  Father,  and  both  the  Father  and 
Holy  Ghost."  "  As  the  solar  rainbow  fades  from 
sight,  and  its  light  continues  to  exist,  so  Christ 
ceases  to  be  manifest  and  yet  is  present."  "  As 
the  rainbow  is  unraveled  light,  so  Christ  is  im- 
raveled  God."  "When  the  rainbow  faded  from 
the  East,  I  did  not  think  it  had  ceased  to  be.  It 
had  not  been  annihilated ;  it  had  been  revealed 
for  a  while,  and,  disappearing,  it  was  received 
back  into  the  bosom  of  the  general  radiance,  and 
yet  continued  to  fall  upon  the  earth.  In  every 
beam  of  white  light  there  is  potentially  all  the 
color  which  we  find  unraveled  in  the  rainbow ;  and 
so  in  all  the  pulsations  in  the  will  of  God  the 
Father  in  his  works  exist  the  pulsations  of  the 
heart  of  Him  who  wept  over  Jerusalem,"  "  for 
there  is  but  one  God."  So  the  Holy  Ghost,  fig- 
ured byJieat,  is  "  Christ's  continued  life."  Such 
is  Mr.  Cook's  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  as  set  forth 
by  himself,  and  he  immediately  proceeds  to  declare 
it  both  scientific  and  scriptural. 

Perhaps  the  most  remarkable  thing  about  this 
illustration  is  the  unstinted-  applause  with  which  it 
was  received  by  his  audience,  made  up  largely  of 


122        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Massachusetts  ministers.  Surely  there  could  be 
no  clearer  evidence  of  the  chaos  that  had  befallen 
theological  thought  in  New  England  than  that  such 
a  bald  Sabellianism  was  enthusiastically  indorsed 
by  such  an  assembly,  and  that  from  that  day  to 
this  no  note  of  criticism  or  dissent  has  been  heard, 
that  I  am  aware  of,  in  trinitarian  circles.  It  may 
be  said  that  Mr.  Cook  should  not  be  judged  by  a 
metaphor.  But  the  metaphor  was  employed  on 
purpose  to  set  forth  his  doctrine,  —  a  doctrine  that 
is  essential  modalism,  going  beyond  Sabellius  him- 
self, and  coming  close  to  the  Patripassianism  out 
of  which  Sabellianism  sprang.  It  is  true  Mr. 
Cook  struggles  to  save  himself  from  the  charge  of 
holding  a  modalistic  view,  but  he  struggles  in  vain. 
His  defense  is  that  "  the  peculiarities  of  Father, 
Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are  incommunicable,"  and 
he  illustrates  this  from  the  properties  of  light, 
color,  and  heat,  which  he  assumes  to  be  likewise 
incommunicable.  But  are  the  peculiar  properties 
of  light,  color,  and  heat  incommunicable  ?  Is  not 
light  always  colored  and  always  warm?  Are  not 
the  seven  colors  of  the  rainbow  always  forms  of 
light  ?  And  when  the  prism  by  a  single  movement 
of  the  hand  changes  a  beam  of  white  light  to  blue 
and  yeUow  and  violet,  has  there  been  no  intercom- 
munication of  light  and  color  ?  And  are  we  to  be 
soberly  assured  that  the  rainbow  which  appears 
and  disappears  with  all  the  changefulness  of  April 
skies  is  a  true  illustration  of  the  second  person  of 
the  Trinity,  and  that  his  peculiar  properties  are 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        123 

yet  "  incommunicable "  ?  Truly  science  has  at 
last  assumed  a  strange  garb.  Wisdom,  as  in  the 
"  Encomium  Moriae  "  of  Erasmus,  puts  on  cap  and 
bells  and  plays  the  part  of  Folly.  But  suppose 
for  the  moment  that  the  properties  of  light  and 
color  and  heat  are  incommunicable,  and  fitly  re- 
present the  relations  of  Father,  Son,  and  Holy 
Ghost,  even  then  Mr.  Cook  is  not  saved  from 
modalism,  for  the  properties  of  light,  color,  and  heat 
are  not  personal :  neither,  in  his  view,  are  Father, 
Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  persons.  What  is  this  but 
modalism  stark  and  clear  I 

But  lest,  peradventure,  we  have  misunderstood 
Mr.  Cook's  rhetoric,  we  pass  to  his  second  lecture. 
Here  we  have,  not  metaphor,  but  philosophy.  The 
premise  is  that  "  a  personal  God  is  immanent  in 
all  matter  and  mind."  Hence  all  nature  and 
spirit,  the  world,  the  soul,  Christ  himself,  are  but 
manifestations  of  God  as  a  person.  There  are 
three  special  revelations  of  God,  —  in  nature,  in 
moral  law,  and  in  Christ.  ''^  But  there  are  not 
three  persons  ;  He  is  one  person  in  the  strict  sense^ 
for  natural  law  is  a  unit  in  the  universe^  and 
reveals  but  one  will.  These  revelations  of  God 
are  all  one  person,  although  in  each  revelation  He 
is  a  person."  (The  italics  are  Mr.  Cook's.) 
This  surely  is  English  unadorned,  and  what  is  its 
doctrine  if  not  modalistic  unitarianism !  God, 
the  lecturer  elsewhere  declares,  is  "  one  will,  one 
heart,  one  conscience,"  "  the  Infinite  Personality." 
He  talks  about "  the  Trinity  of  the  Divine  Nature," 


124        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

"the  three  spheres  of  God's  self-manifestation," 
"  in  each  of  which  the  Ineffable  Immanent  Person 
says  something  new."  This  trinity  of  divine  mani- 
festations Mr.  Cook  holds  to  be  "  scientifically 
demonstrable,"  and  he  winds  up  a  whole  page  of 
italics  with  this  conclusion  :  "  A  Personal  Trinity, 
of  which  Creator,  Redeemer,  and  Sanctifier  are 
hut  other  names,  is  scientifically  known  to  exist," 
and  then  he  adds  directly :  "  This  is  the  Trinity 
which  Christianity  calls  Father,  Son,  and  Holy 
Ghost."  Had  Mr.  Cook  given  this  remarkable 
exposition  of  a  modal  trinity  simply  as  his  own 
theological  opinion,  I  should  take  no  exception  to 
it,  so  far ;  but  when  he  declares  that  it  represents 
historical  Christianity,  I  must,  in  the  interest  of 
historical  truth,  emphatically  demur.  Mr.  Cook's 
three  lectures  are  a  travesty  of  history.  His  so- 
called  trinitarianism  is  neither  Athanasian,  nor 
even  Augustinian,  no,  nor  even  that  of  the  Pseudo- 
Athanasian  creed.  It  is  not  early  New  England 
unitarianism.  Channing  would  have  denounced 
it  as  a  hybrid  unitarianism,  and  such  it  is.  No 
wonder  Mr.  Cook  closes  his  third  lecture  with  a 
grand  cosmic  description  of  the  dome  of  the  sky, 
and  uses  it  to  illustrate  what  he  caUs  "  God's  uni- 
tarianism."    History  must  call  it  Mr.  Cook's. 

I  have  spoken  of  Mr.  Cook  as  a  leader  in  a  new 
phase  of  trinitarian  evolution.  It  is  noticeable 
that  he  no  longer  wavers  on  the  question  of  God's 
single  personahty.  Traditional  orthodoxy  had 
said,  "  one  God  in  three  Persons."     H.  B.  Smith 


NEW    ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        125 

and  Domer  said,  "  one  absolute  Personality  in 
three  personal  modes  of  being,"  denying,  however, 
that  the  Divine  Personality  is  unipersonal.  Dr. 
Shedd  said  that  God  is  both  unipersonal  and  tri- 
personal.  But  Mr.  Cook  is  innocent  of  such  tran- 
scendental ambidexterities.  He  declares  boldly, 
"  There  are  not  three  persons.  God  is  one  person 
in  the  strict  sense."  This  is  what  Smith  called 
"Deism,"  but  it  is  theism,  as  we  have  already 
shown,  and  Mr.  Cook  is  to  be  heartily  commended 
for  helping  to  rescue  theological  thought  from  that 
German  "  Serbonian  bog ; "  though  it  may  be  a 
question  whether  he  has  mended  matters  by  accept- 
ing the  other  horn  of  the  dilemma.  The  Smith- 
Dorner  school  seemed  to  emphasize  the  trinitarian 
side  of  the  Divine  personality,  but  Mr.  Cook 
throws  the  emphasis  completely  on  the  side  of 
unity.  He  has  thus  saved  Monotheism,  but  utterly 
broken  down  Trinitarianism. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott  and 
Dr.  A.  H.  Bradford  join  hands  with  Mr.  Cook. 
According  to  both  of  them  God  as  a  Trinity  is 
imipersonal.  They  declare  themselves  Trinitarians, 
but  their  trinitarianism  is  merely  nominal.  Dr. 
Abbott,  in  a  published  sermon,  criticises  the  for- 
mula "three  persons  in  one  God,"  which,  he  says, 
"  is  a  good  phrase  not  to  use."  He  assumes  that 
three  persons  are  three  Gods,  as  Mr.  Cook  also 
did,  and  asserts  with  emphasis  :  "  There  is  one  God, 
only  one  God."  But  is  Christ  this  "  one  God  "  ? 
Dr.  Abbott  seems  to  give  a  clear  affirmative  answer. 


126        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

He  declares  that  "  Jesus  Christ  is  God  living  a 
human  life,"  "  the  incarnate  God."  In  his  "  Evo- 
lution of  Christianity "  he  makes  Christ  "  the 
cause  rather  than  a  product  of  evolution,"  and 
describes  him  as  "  the  Infinite  entering  into  human 
life  and  taking  on  the  finite."  More  explicitly 
still  he  says:  "In  Jesus  Christ  in  propria  persona 
God  has  entered  human  life  in  order  that  He  might 
show  us  who  He  is."  "  Incarnation,"  he  says,  "  is 
the  indwelling  of  God  in  a  unique  man."  This  is 
plainly  a  doctrine  of  Christ's  essential  Deity.  But 
is  the  Son  a  distinct  person  from  the  Father? 
And  is  the  Spirit  a  distinct  person  from  the  Son  ? 
Let  Dr.  Abbott's  exegesis  of  John  xiv.  concerning 
the  Comforter  give  the  answer.  "  Another  Com- 
forter," he  says,  is  simply  an  assumed  name  for 
Christ  himseK.  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are 
simply  different  names  for  one  person.  "  Now  it 
is  '  another  Comforter,'  now  it  is  himself  ('  I  will 
come  unto  you '),  now  it  is  the  Father,  now  it  is 
all  three;  there  is  no  difference."  It  is  "One 
God  revealing  himself"  in  these  varied  forms. 
Dr.  Abbott  is  somewhat  wary,  and  makes  other 
statements  which  look  toward  a  more  humanitarian 
view  of  Christ,  but  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  his 
trinitarianism  from  Mr.  Cook's  modalistic  patripas- 
sian  unitarianism.  Dr.  Bradford  is  more  out- 
spoken. "  The  problem  of  the  Trinity  is  simply 
this :  Are  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  three  names 
for  one  being,  or  do  they  denote  three  distinct  per- 
sons ?  "    And  the  answer  is  squarely  given.     "  The 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        127 

Trinity  does  not  mean  three  distinct  persons,  but 
three  distinctions  in  one  person."  Father,  Son, 
and  Holy  Ghost  are  names  of  three  impersonal  dis- 
tinctions. "  Whenever  the  Father  is  represented 
as  coming  into  relations  with  men,  the  name  is  Son 
or  Logos."  It  is  then  the  Father  under  the  name 
of  Son  or  Logos  that  became  incarnate  and  died 
on  the  cross ;  but  this  is  unadulterated  Patripas- 
sianism.  Thus  curiously  has  the  evolution  of  so- 
called  trinitarianism  from  the  time  of  Augustine 
swung  around  the  circle  and  reached  its  final  logi- 
cal result  in  the  oldest  known  form  of  unitarianism 
in  the  early  church,  —  the  doctrine  that  the  one 
God,  the  Father  Almighty,  became  man  and  suf- 
fered and  died. 

Our  survey  has  brought  us  to  a  position  where 
it  can  be  clearly  seen  that  we  have  come  to  a  crit- 
ical turning-point  in  the  history  of  trinitarian 
thought.  The  old  cycle  has  run  itself  out,  and  a 
new  cycle  must  inevitably  begin.  This  fact  will  be 
illustrated  in  the  fourth  and  last  phase  to  which 
I  shall  call  attention,  —  the  doctrine  of  the  essen- 
tial dimneness  of  humanity  and  preeminently  of 
Christy  the  unique  representative  of  mankind^  who 
was,  in  this  sense^  a  true  incarnation  of  Deity. 
This  type  of  dogma  is  so  new  and  unformed  that 
it  is  somewhat  difficult  to  fix  it ;  but  Dr.  Phillips 
Brooks,  Dr.  J.  M.  Whiton,  and  Dr.  George  A. 
Gordon  may  be  mentioned  as  representatives  of  its 
essential  elements  and  tendencies.  The  underly- 
ing idea  of  this  school,  viz.,  that  man  was  created 


128        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

in  the  divine  image  and  is  thus  a  real  "partaker  of 
the  divine  nature,"  is  of  course  not  new.  It  is  not 
only  Biblical,  it  vitalized  the  noblest  philosophies 
and  religions  of  the  ancient  world.  The  filial 
relation  of  man  to  God,  and  the  capacity  and  duty 
of  man  to  become  like  God,  was  a  fundamental 
note  in  the  faith  of  Socrates  and  Plato  centuries 
before  Christ  uttered  his  parable  of  the  Prodigal 
Son.  But  the  new  dogma  of  "  the  essential  divine- 
ness  of  humanity"  is  something  more  than  this. 
There  lurks  in  it  a  metaphysical  monistic  strain 
that  reminds  us  of  Plotinus  and  the  Stoics.  Plo- 
tinus  ("  Enneads,"  iv.  7,  10)  expressly  argues  for 
the  divineness  and  immortality  of  the  soul,  on  the 
ground  that  it  is  homoousios  with  Deity.  So  this 
school  proclaims  the  consubstantiality  of  man  with 
God,  borrowing  the  Nicene  watchword,  and  apply- 
ing it  to  aU  mankind,  as  being  equally  constituted 
Sons  of  God.  We  have  seen  why  Athanasius 
restricted  the  term  homoousios  to  the  second  per- 
son of  the  Trinity.  He  drew  the  line  sharply 
between  the  uncreated  and  the  created.  The  un- 
created divine  Three  are  homoousioi^  but  all  cre- 
ated beings  are  heterousioi.  This  was  the  point 
of  his  controversy  with  Arius.  If  Christ  is  a  cre- 
ated being,  as  Arius  held,  then  he  is  not  homoovr 
sios  with  the  Father,  and  so  ceases  to  be  truly 
divine.  Such  was  the  reasoning  of  Athanasius, 
grounded  on  his  dualistic  Platonic  ideas.  We 
have  also  seen  how  Augustine's  doctrine  of  Divine 
immanence  drawn  from  New  Platonic  sources  gave 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        129 

a  new  monistic  direction  to  western  thought,  and 
we  have  traced  its  onward  movement,  growing 
more  and  more  pantheistic  in  its  spirit  down  to 
the  present  day.  Kecent  developments  in  physical 
science  have  done  much  to  strengthen  this  monistic 
current.  Monism  is  no  doubt  the  last  word  in  all 
the  sciences.  There  is  one  ultimate  force,  one 
law,  one  evolution,  one  universe.  But  science 
properly  stops  with  matter ;  it  raises  no  question 
concerning  the  transcendental  background  of 
material  existence.  The  dualistic  theism  of  Plato 
and  Athanasius  has  no  controversy  with  the  mo- 
nism of  science.  It  is  a  monistic  philosophy y  not 
a  monistic  science  keeping  within  its  own  bounds, 
that  crosses  the  border  line  between  the  transcen- 
dental and  the  material  sphere,  and  proclaims  a 
homoousianism  that  covers  both.  But  can  this 
step  be  taken  ?  Is  it  necessitated  by  the  discov- 
eries of  science  ?  And  if  so,  what  then  ?  What 
is  the  relation  of  spirit  and  matter,  of  the  eternal 
to  the  temporal?  Are  all  things  essentially 
spirit?  Or  are  they  essentially  matter?  And, 
whether  spiritual  or  material,  are  they  homo^ 
ousioi  f  Is  there  something  of  divinity,  as  Plo- 
tinus  thought,  in  the  lowest  forms  of  existence  ? 

Such  are  the  questions  that  lie  in  the  background 
of  present  theological  thought.  It  is  to  be  said  at 
once  that  the  new  school  does  not  leave  the  monis- 
tic track  of  its  predecessors.  The  leaven  of  Ger- 
man metaphysical  idealism  which  we  saw  working 
in  the  school  of  Smith  and  Shedd  reappears  in  a 


130        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

still  more  pronounced  form  in  this  latest  phase  of 
Trinitarianism.  Especially  is  the  influence  of  R.  W. 
Emerson  and  F.  H.  Hedge  discernible.  Phillips 
Brooks's  sermon  on  "  Identity  and  Variety,"  and 
Dr.  Gordon's  use  of  "  the  principle  of  identity  and 
difference  "  in  setting  forth  his  view  of  the  Trinity 
and  of  Christ's  deity,  seem  to  have  their  common 
source  in  Emerson's  definition  of  philosophy,  as 
based  on  "  two  cardinal  facts,  the  one  and  the  two ; 
unity  or  identity  and  variety,  oneness  and  other- 
ness." So  the  new  language  concerning  the  In- 
carnation reminds  one  strangely  of  Emerson's 
description  of  Christ :  "  One  man  was  true  to  what 
is  in  you  and  me.  He  saw  that  God  incarnates 
himseK  in  man,  and  evermore  goes  forth  anew  to 
take  possession  of  his  world,"  and  in  that  sublime 
consciousness  "  he  declared  '  I  am  divine.'  "  But 
perhaps  the  influence  of  Hedge  has  been  quite  as 
potent.  He  more  than  any  other  man  has  set  the 
current  toward  the  new  doctrine  of  the  consubstan- 
tiality  of  man  with  God.  He  accepts  the  Athana- 
sian  homoousianism  as  true.  "  God  in  man  and 
man  in  God,"  he  declares,  "  is  its  underlying  idea." 
Only  "  Athanasius  did  not  perceive  that  what  was 
true  of  Christ  is  true  of  other  men."  "  The  fault 
of  the  trinitarian  doctrine  is  what  it  omits  to  teach." 
This  is  the  very  line  of  the  new  trinitarian  depar- 
ture. Its  fundamental  premise  is  "the  essential 
kinship  of  the  divine  and  the  human."  The  ser- 
mons of  Phillips  Brooks  are  pervaded  with  this 
idea.     The  underlying  assumption  everywhere  is 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        131 

the  dignity  and  worth  of  man  in  virtue  of  his 
essential  and  eternal  relation  to  God.  In  one  re- 
markable sermon  especially,  entitled  "  The  Eternal 
Humanity,"  Brooks  has  given  a  clear  metaphysics 
of  his  theology.  The  text  is,  "  I  am  Alpha  and 
Omega,  the  Beginning  and  the  End,  the  First  and 
the  Last."  "  Here  Christ  asserts  his  own  eternity, ^^ 
"  Before  man  was  made,  the  man-type  existed  in 
God."  "  This  man-type  is  part  and  parcel  of  the 
everlasting  Godhead."  The  God-man  was  eternal, 
and  the  incarnation  was  only  the  "  exhibition  "  of 
his  "eternal  manhood  in  the  Godhead."  "  Human 
nature"  therefore  "did  not  begin  with  Adam," 
who  was  only  the  copy  of  an  eternal  original ;  hence 
man  is  in  the  divine  image  or  homoousios.  This 
is  certainly  a  new  theological  metaphysics.  Dr. 
Brooks  does  not  break  with  the  orthodox  creeds ; 
but  what  precisely  is  his  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  ? 
Is  it  Sabellian?  It  looks  that  way.  And  what 
of  the  Incarnation?  If  the  Word  was  eternally 
human,  how  could  he  "become  flesh,"  in  the  sense 
of  becoming  man  ?  There  was  then  no  true  incar- 
nation in  the  historic  sense.  The  eternal  God-man, 
when  Jesus  was  born,  only  appeared  to  assume 
himian  nature.  But  this  is  the  old  Gnostic  Doce- 
tism. 

Dr.  G.  A.  Gordon's  book,  "  The  Christ  of  To- 
Day,"  may  be  regarded  as  a  metaphysical  inter- 
pretation of  Phillips  Brooks's  sermons.  Its  aim  is 
avowedly  speculative.  Dr.  Gordon  insists  that 
Christ's    gospel   cannot    be   adequately  preached 


132         EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

without  an  "  intellectual  appreciation  "  of  his  per- 
son and  nature.  "  Ethics  are  the  outcome  of  meta- 
physics." Moreover,  Dr.  Gordon  thinks  that  the 
time  has  come  for  "  a  new  conception  of  Christ," 
that  is,  a  new  christology.  But  he  frankly  ac- 
knowledges the  "  difficulty  "  and  "  embarrassment " 
of  the  "  problem,"  which  is,  —  "  whether  Jesus  is 
the  supreme  and  imique  representative  of  the  hu- 
manity of  God,  the  proper  incarnation  of  the  Filial 
in  the  being  of  the  Infinite."  This  assumes  "  that 
in  God  there  is  the  Eternal  Prototype  of  human- 
ity." Hence  "  man  is  constituted  in  the  Eternal 
Humanity."  This  "  consubstantiality  of  man  with 
God  "  is  revealed  through  the  incarnation  "  which 
is  the  assertion  of  the  divine  meaning  of  history." 
But  the  speculative  question  is  not  yet  answered, 
how  Christ  is  so  uniquely  related  to  God  and 
man.  What  is  Christ's  metaphysical  being  ?  and 
what  is  the  metaphysical  character  of  the  incarna- 
tion? Dr.  Gordon  faces  these  questions,  and  a 
large  part  of  his  book  is  occupied  with  their  con- 
sideration. But  I  must  confess  that  I  do  not  find 
a  clear  answer.  "  This  Eternal  Prototype  of  hu- 
manity in  the  Godhead,"  who  is  he,  or  what  is  it  ? 
Is  he  the  "  Son  of  God  "  of  the  Nicene  creed,  or  an 
impersonal  form  of  existence  of  the  one  God?  I 
find  but  one  intelligible  answer,  —  the  old  familiar 
Sabellianism.  Dr.  Gordon  holds  to  "  one  absolute 
Person"  in  the  Godhead,  and  his  trinitarianism, 
which  he  unfolds  with  such  elaborate  ingenuity 
by  means  of  "  identity  and  difference,"  is  whoUy 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        133 

modalistic  and  monistic,  not  to  say  pantheistic. 
His  Eternal  Humanity  is  "ideal,"  as  lie  himself 
confesses,  and  so  is  his  "  Eternal  Christ."  Who 
then  is  the  "historic  Christ"?  Is  he  the  same 
with  the  "  Eternal  Christ "  ?  By  no  means.  Dr. 
Gordon  is  continually  putting  them  into  sharp  con- 
trast. Jesus  is  "  the  supreme  person  in  time  "  over 
against  "  the  supreme  person  beyond  time."  As  a 
person,  then,  he  belongs  to  the  temporal  and  not 
to  the  eternal.  But  did  Christ's  earthly  personality 
begin  with  his  human  birth,  or  was  he  personally 
preexistent  ?  Athanasianism  says  he  was  eternally 
the  Son  of  God.  Patripassianism  says  he  was  the 
Father  himself.  What  is  the  answer  of  the  new 
school  ?  Dr.  Gordon  seems  to  beg  the  question ; 
but  I  do  not  understand  him  to  be  Athanasian  or 
Patripassian.  His  "  Absolute  Personality  "  is  not 
three  Persons  certainly,  in  any  ordinary  sense  of 
person.  If  "  God  is  a  self-conscious  being,"  as  Dr. 
Gordon  affirms,  he  must  be  a  personal  being,  and 
if  the  Infinite  consciousness  is  one,  as  Dr.  Gordon 
also  affirms,  then  God  must  be  unipersonal.  But 
since  God-s  consciousness  is  infinite,  it  must,  sui' 
cording  to  Dr.  Gordon,  include  aU  things.  "  All 
creatures,  all  persons  are,  in  a  true  sense,  modes  of 
the  one  Infinite  consciousness."  Then  "  why  not 
three  Eternal  Distinctions  behind  these  multitudi- 
nous temporal  distinctions?"  Surely,  why  not  I 
And  this  is  the  argument  from  "Identity  and 
Difference  "  for  the  Christian  Trinity.  Is  it  any 
wonder  that  Dr.  Gordon  declares  that  "  historical 


134        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

pantheism  is  in  error  only  through  its  exclusive- 
ness"?  But  if  Christ  is  not  an  eternal  Divine 
Person  in  the  old  trinitarian  sense,  what  metaphy- 
sical basis  is  left  for  his  moral  supremacy  ?  May 
not  Ritschlianism,  Dr.  Gordon's  he,te  noir^  which 
rests  Christ's  claims  on  moral  grounds,  rather  than 
metaphysical,  be  a  safer  position  after  all  ? 

The  essential  metaphysical  weakness  of  this 
school  which  starts  from  the  idea  of  the  essential 
divineness  of  human  nature  is  its  inability  to  con- 
struct any  clear  doctrine  of  the  incarnation.  If 
God  is  eternally  human  and  humanity  is  eternally 
divine,  why  is  an  incarnation  necessary?  In  this 
view  the  very  ground  of  an  incarnation,  that  is, 
the  incoming  of  divinity  into  humanity,  is  taken 
away.  Athanasius  made  an  incarnation  the  central 
doctrine  of  his  theology,  because  "  God  must  be 
made  man  so  that  man  may  be  made  divine."  But 
monism  finds  no  such  necessity.  Further,  suppose 
incarnation  a  reality,  why  is  not  every  human  birth 
also  a  divine  incarnation  ?  And  if  so,  what  was 
there  "  unique  "  in  Christ's  incarnation  ?  The  logi- 
cal result  of  this  view  is  to  deny  any  metaphysical 
or  "physiological"  incarnation  at  all,  and  to  reduce 
it  to  an  ethical  movement  of  the  Divine  spirit 
realized  in  others  besides  Christ ;  and  such  is  the 
actual  position  taken  by  Dr.  Whiton,  who  boldly 
carries  this  position  to  its  final  conclusions.  In  an 
article  on  "  A  Way  out  of  the  Trinitarian  Contro- 
versy," 1  Dr.  Whiton  declares  the  old  doctrine  of 
1  The  New  World,  September, 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        135 

Divine  incarnation  "  a  paganish  notion.'*  "  The 
physiological  notion  of  incarnation  must  give  place 
to  the  ethical  one."  Dr.  Whiton  squarely  classes 
himself  with  Christian  monists.  Dualism  is  "  now 
discredited."  "  There  is  but  one  spiritual  nature, 
and  that  may  be  indifferently  spoken  of  as  divine 
or  human."  "  This  one  nature  belongs  equally  to 
God,  to  Christ,  and  to  mankind."  The  universal 
God  is  "  individualized  in  each  personal  conscience." 
"  The  centre  of  the  trinitarian  conception  is  that 
God  is  ever  immanent  and  ever  incarnating  him- 
self." 1  "  The  incarnation  of  God  is  not  a  mere 
event,  but  an  age-long  process."  Christ  is  not  the 
only  Son  of  God.  There  are  many  sons,  and  many 
incarnations.  Surely ;  why  not  ?  as  I  above  sug- 
gested. And  who  is  Christ?  A  man,  with  a  "full 
and  natural  humanity."  His  "  uniqueness  "  con- 
sists in  his  moral  perfection,  which  "  entitles  him 
to  be  called  divine,  in  distinction  from  those  who 
by  nature  are  partakers  of  one  life  with  him  and 
sons  of  God,  as  he  is."  Yet,  strangely.  Dr.  Whiton 
calls  himself  a  Trinitarian,  and  takes  special  pains 
to  deny  all  affinity  with  Sabellianism  or  pantheism. 
The  thing  to  be  noted  is  that,  under  all  this  Sabel- 
lianizing,  pantheistic  trinitarianism.  Dr.  Whiton 
holds  Christ  to  be  a  man  essentially  like  other 
men;  and  this  view  is  plainly  gaining  ground 
among  professed  Trinitarians.  Such  is  the  view 
of  Dr.  A.  J.  F.  Behrends,  as  given  in  a  sermon  re- 
cently published,  and  also  of  W.  Beyschlag.  Both 
1  QUma  Patri,  pp.  152, 129. 


136        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

hold  to  a  modalistic  Trinity,  and  yet  to  Clirist's 
essential  humanity.  How  two  such  contrasted 
conceptions  can  be  speculatively  harmonized  is  an 
unsettled  question.  But  plainly  behind  all  this 
style  of  thinking  is  Hegelianism.^ 

Two  impressions  are  made  on  me  by  this  review 
of  recent  theological  thinking.  First,  its  thoroughly 
dogmatic  character.  The  historical  spirit  which 
has  so  deeply  penetrated  our  age  has  plainly  made 
little  impression  as  yet  on  orthodox  theologians. 
They  still  deal  in  the  ideal  and  the  abstract,  and 
seek  to  build  theology  on  metaphysical  foundations. 
Dr.  Fairbaim's  volume,  "  The  Place  of  Christ  in 
Modem  Theology,"  well  illustrates  this.  In  that 
book  the  historical  spirit  wrestles  with  the  dog- 

^  Fichte,  T^ho  anticipated  Hegel,  in  his  later  thinkings  made 
much  of  the  proem  of  the  fourth  Gospel,  because  it  seemed  to 
him  to  sustain  the  idea  of  a  timeless  revelation  of  God  in  the 
world.  The  incarnation  he  explained  in  a  transcendental  way  as 
occurring  in  the  case  of  aU  spiritual  men,  in  the  same  manner  as 
in  Jesus  Christ.  Such  an  incarnation  of  the  Logos  in  man,  in  his 
view,  merges  him  in  God  and  he  becomes  "  aU  in  all,"  —  a  panthe- 
ism that  outreaches  Plotinus  himself  (see  Schwegler's  Handbook 
of  the  History  of  Philosophy j  p.  276,  translated  by  Stirling). 

Dr.  A.  H.  Strong,  in  a  recent  series  of  articles  on  Ethical  Mo- 
nism, says :  *'  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  monistic  philosophy, 
in  its  yarions  forms,  holds  at  present  almost  undisputed  sway  in 
our  American  universities."  He  gives  it  welcome  and  sums  up 
his  own  doctrine :  "  There  is  but  one  substance,  God.  The  Eternal 
Word,  whom  we  call  Christ,  is  the  only  complete  expression  of 
God."  *  *  Matter,  humanity,  and  the  incarnation  "  are  "  seK-limita- 
tions  of  Christ."  Wherein  Dr.  Strong's  view  differs  from  Spinoza 
is  not  easy  to  say.  Spinoza's  "extension  and  thought,"  which 
are  "  empirically  derived  determinations  "  of  "  one  absolute  sub- 
stance "  which  Spinoza  calls  God,  correspond  quite  closely  to  Dr. 
Strong's  '^  matter  and  humanity."  Yet  Dr.  Strong  is  a  stanch 
Calvinistic  Trinitarian. 


NEW  ENGLAND  TRINITARIANISM        137 

matic,  but  unsuccessfully.  The  watchword,  "  Back 
to  Christ,"  with  which  the  book  begins,  dies  into 
an  echo,  and  we  have  "  the  lame  and  impotent 
conclusion  "  that  the  consciousness  of  Jesus  gives 
us  an  Augustinian  fifth-century  christology.  Dr. 
Gordon  well  says  that  "  philosophy  must  always  be 
tried  at  the  bar  of  history."  It  is  the  truest  word 
in  his  brilliant  but  inconclusive  book.  To  that 
Caesar  must  final  appeal  be  made.  But  the  his- 
torical method  that  sits  in  judgment  to-day  on  all 
human  knowledge  demands  facts,  not  fancies. 
Metaphysics  has  its  function,  but  it  is  useless  for 
practical  ethics  and  religion,  unless  based  on  a 
solid  scientific  induction. 

Again,  it  is  impressed  upon  me  that  theological 
thought  is  still  largely  cast  in  the  old  theological 
moulds.  Trinity,  generation,  consubstantial,  in- 
carnation, God-man, — terms  invented  and  made 
current  coin  by  Greek  philosophers  and  theolo- 
gians, are  still  the  familiar  watchwords  of  ortho- 
doxy. The  bottles  are  old,  but  the  wine  is  new 
and  the  old  flavor  has  gone.  The  law  of  evolution 
that  runs  through  all  history  has  done  its  work 
here  as  elsewhere.  The  notable  thing  is  that  men 
are  so  unconscious  of  the  change.  A  Catholic 
writer  has  charitably  declared  that  good  Protest- 
ants are  "  unconscious  Catholics."  It  would  not 
be  surprising  if  it  should  be  found  that  there  are 
some  Trinitarians  who  are  "  unconscious  "  Unita- 
rians. 

As  I  close  this  survey  of  the  evolution  of  the 
trinitarian  dogma,   I  recur  to  the   question  with 


138        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

wMcli  I  began :  Is  Trinitarianism  in  New  England 
to-day  Athanasian  ?  Certainly  I  have  failed  to 
accomplisli  what  has  been  the  chief  aim  of  these 
chapters,  if  the  answer  to  this  question  is  not  now 
clear.  With  Hopkins  the  last  trace  of  genuine 
Athanasianism  disappears ;  and  from  Emmons 
down  to  the  present  day  Augustinianism  has  been 
completely  in  the  ascendant.  The  idea  so  widely 
prevalent  that  we  are  having  an  Origenistic  or 
Athanasian  renaissance  is  one  of  the  "  curiosities 
of  literature."  Origen's  "  eternal  generation,"  in 
its  Origenistic  meaning,  is  as  dead  as  Pan.  His 
Platonism,  with  its  idealistic  dualism  and  Logos 
doctrine,  shows  no  sign  of  revival.  Plato  is  stiU 
enthroned  in  the  hearts  of  men,  by  reason  of  his 
splendid  genius,  but  the  real  interpreter  of  Plato 
to  this  age  is  the  disciple  whose  writings  are  still 
mostly  buried  in  their  original  Greek,  but  whose 
subtle  thought  has  been  reincarnated  in  a  long 
succession  of  illustrious  thinkers,  —  Augustine's 
"  renowned  PlotinusJ^ 


CHAPTER  rV 

THE  TRINITARIAN   OUTLOOK 

In  the  previous  cliapters  the  history  of  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  Christian  dogma  of  the  Trinity  has 
been  sketched  down  to  the  present  day.  Here  our 
task  as  a  historian  would  seem  to  end.  History, 
strictly  speaking,  deals  only  with  what  is  past. 
But  the  historical  spirit  easily  and  naturally  passes 
into  the  prophetic  spirit.  The  truly  critical  and 
philosophic  historian  is  also  a  prophet.  The  great 
prophets  of  Israel  were  simply  religious  interpret- 
ers of  history  to  their, own  age.  Their  prophecies 
so  called  were  the  true  reading  of  passing  events 
in  the  Hght  of  the  spiritual  laws  that  govern  all 
historical  movements.  For  history  is  no  exception 
to  that  principle  or  law  of  orderly  sequence  in 
all  living  things  which  we  call  evolution.  Even 
free  will,  which  might  be  regarded  as  an  uncertain 
factor  in  human  affairs,  because  free  and  contin- 
gent, and  so  under  no  law  of  necessity,  yet  acts 
under  motive  and  a  law  of  rationality  which  re- 
moves its  volitions  from  the  sphere  of  chance  to 
the  sphere  of  moral  causation.  Cause  and  effect 
have  their  place  just  as  surely  in  hmnan  events  as 
in  the   events  of  nature.      In   aU  organic  life, 


140        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

whether  lower  or  higher,  there  is  "  first  the  blade, 
then  the  ear,  then  the  full  com  in  the  ear."  In 
everything  human  "  the  child  is  father  of  the 
man."  There  was  a  large  element  of  historical 
truth  in  Lessing's  comparison  of  the  world  to  "  a 
colossal  man,"  for  it  too  has  its  childhood  and 
youth  and  manhood ;  and  its  laws  of  growth, 
maturity,  and  decline  may  be  clearly  discovered. 
It  required  only  a  clear  historical  insight  to  pre- 
dict the  sure  downfall  of  the  Roman  Empire  in 
the  days  of  Tiberius  and  Nero  and  Domitian,  as 
Israel's  prophets  had  already  done  in  the  times  of 
its  national  backslidings  and  degeneracy.  So  there 
is  a  law  of  intellectual  evolution  that  works  out 
its  results  in  the  history  of  human  beliefs  and 
speculations.  From  the  standpoint  already  reached 
in  the  survey  of  trinitarian  history  we  may  extend 
our  outlook  into  the  coming  years  and  read  with 
measured  confidence  the  broad  outlines  of  its  now 
hidden  issues.  Such  is  the  purpose  of  this  chap- 
ter concerning  the  future  prospects  of  New  Eng- 
land Trinitarianism.  But  it  must  not  be  forgotten 
that  all  true  prophecy  rests  on  true  history,  and 
cannot  for  a  moment  be  dissociated  from  it. 

First  of  all,  then,  let  us  sum  up  and  get  clearly 
in  view  the  result  of  our  previous  studies.  New 
England  Trinitarianism  to-day  is  in  a  disorganized, 
inchoate  condition.  It  is  passing  through  a  radi- 
cal turning-point  in  its  evolution,  sloughing  off  its 
old  shell  and  developing  a  new  one.  At  such  a 
time  it  is  always  difficult  to  give  an  exact  diagnosis 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  141 

of  theological  opinions.  But,  bearing  in  mind  the 
most  recent  trinitarian  tendencies,  as  we  have 
sketched  them  in  a  previous  chapter,  and  watching 
the  direction  of  the  theological  winds  from  the 
straws  of  local  and  individual  as  well  as  more 
ecumenical  dogmatic  declarations,  it  may  be  said, 
speaking  broadly,  that  present  New  England  Trin- 
itarianism  is  characterized  by  three  principal  fea- 
tures :  First,  its  Sabellian  Patripassianism.  I 
unite  these  two  terms  which  really  represent  two 
quite  distinct  forms  of  trinitarian  doctrine,  because 
the  whole  tendency  of  New  England  trinitarian 
belief  along  the  line  of  the  Sabellian  type  of  theo- 
logical thought  has  been  more  and  more  strongly 
toward  the  Patripassian  type.  The  preceding 
chapter  fully  illustrates  this  fact.  SabeUianism 
allows  a  trinity  of  distinctions  in  God,  or  of  divine 
modes  of  existence,  using  the  word  "  person  "  in  a 
secondary  sense  to  describe  those  distinctions  or 
modes,  but  not  accepting  a  real  tri-personality.  In 
this  view  the  Son  or  second  person  is  distinguished 
from  the  Father  or  first  person  in  some  real  man- 
ner, though  it  may  be  difficult  to  gather  precisely 
in  what  manner.  But  Patripassianism  loses  sight 
of  all  real  distinctions  of  any  kind  and  wholly  con- 
founds the  Son  with  the  Father,  making  the  Son 
so  called  to  be  actually  the  Father,  but  in  a  sort 
of  disguise.  We  have  seen  that  the  earlier  New 
England  trinitarian  leaders  such  as  Emmons,  Stu- 
art, Bushnell,  H.  B.  Smith,  Shedd,  remained  on 
Sabellian  ground.     But  Mr.  Joseph  Cook  moved 


142        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

on  to  the  Patripassian  position,  and  Drs.  Lyman 
Abbott  and  A.  H.  Bradford  and  others  followed 
in  the  same  general  path.  According  to  these 
thinkers,  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are  but 
different  names  and  manifestations  of  one  and  the 
same  personal  Being.  This  Being  has  his  com- 
pletest  manifestation  in  Jesus  Christ.  Thus  the 
Deity  of  Christ  is  made  the  central  and  most  vital 
doctrine  in  their  theology.  He  is  manifested  God 
or  "God  manifest  in  the  flesh."  This  phrase 
"God  manifest  in  the  flesh"  is  now  being  con- 
stantly employed  by  defenders  of  the  dogma  of 
Christ's  true  Deity  and  has  become  a  sort  of 
watchword  and  shibboleth  of  orthodoxy.  But  it 
contains  a  gross  interpolation,  as  all  scholars  are 
aware.  The  original  language  of  Paul  was  "  He 
who  was  manifest  in  the  flesh ; "  and  he  was  de- 
scribing Christ  in  his  incarnate  life,  with  no  hint 
of  any  allusion  in  the  whole  passage  to  God,  whom 
Paul  never  confounded  with  Jesus  of  Nazareth. 
Several  interpolations  of  a  like  sort  are  to  be  found 
in  the  New  Testament,  made  in  a  similar  theologi- 
cal interest  in  times  that  were  whoUy  wanting  in 
historical  criticism,  and  when  such  interpolations 
and  changes  in  the  text  were  difficult  of  discovery, 
since  new  transcriptions  of  manuscripts  were  con- 
tinually being  made.  The  history  of  this  interpo- 
lation and  of  its  discovery,  showing  how  6's  was 
changed  into  Oio^,  is  one  of  the  most  curious  and 
remarkable  chapters  in  textual  criticism.  The  new 
version  of   the  New  Testament  has  restored  the 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  143 

true  text,  and  removed  "  God  "  from  the  passage. 
Why  scholarly  men  should  continue  to  use  a  phrase 
that  has  been  so  clearly  proved  to  be  spurious  is 
somewhat  difficult  of  comprehension.  The  persis- 
tency with  which  they  employ  it  shows  how  easily 
it  suits  their  Sabellianizing  and  Patripassianizing 
type  of  thinking.  Certainly  the  phrase  is  a  good 
one  to  juggle  with.  It  has  a  breadth  and  elas- 
ticity that  makes  a  wide  interpretation  possible. 
There  is  a  monistic  pantheistic  flavor  about  it  that 
conunends  it  to  our  age.  But  even  assuming 
that  Paul  wrote  the  clause  as  interpolated,  it  can- 
not be  interpreted  to  mean  that  Christ  is  Abso- 
lute Deity.  Paul  held  firmly  to  the  Jewish  mono- 
theism. "There  is  one  God  and  one  Mediator 
between  God  and  man,  the  man  Christ  Jesus." 
Paul  never  confoimds  Christ  with  God.  God  for 
him  is  always  the  one  only  eternal  and  invisible. 
Jesus  Christ  was  a  manifestation  of  God  in  the 
flesh.  But  what  kind  of  a  manifestation  ?  There 
are  many  manifestations  of  God.  Nature  is  a 
manifestation  of  God.  Paul  declares  that  God's 
power  and  divinity  are  known  by  the  things  that 
are  made.  So  is  man  a  manifestation  of  God, 
having  been  created  in  his  true  image.  But  nature 
and  man  are  not  identical  with  God.  The  thing 
formed  is  not  the  same  with  him  who  formed  it. 
Such  identity  is  pantheism.  There  is  no  such  doc- 
trine in  Genesis  or  in  Paul.  If  Christ  was  a  mani- 
festation of  God  in  that  natural  scriptural  sense, 
what  ground  is  there  in  this  passage  for  claiming 


144        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Christ's  supreme  Deity  ?  Yet  this  is  just  the  in- 
terpretation given  by  the  trinitarian  theologians 
who  are  so  frequently  quoting  it.  In  illustration 
I  wish  to  call  attention  to  the  addresses  made 
at  the  recent  semi-centennial  anniversary  of  the 
Plymouth  Church  in  Brooklyn. 

I  do  this  the  more  readily  because  this  series  of 
meetings  was  made  the  occasion  of  setting  forth 
"  the  new  Puritanism,"  in  other  words,  the  new 
New  England  theology,  on  two  special  points,  the 
Calvinistic  anthropology  and  the  Nicene  Trinita- 
rianism.  With  its  new  statement  of  Calvinism  I 
am  not  now  concerned,  but  the  "  new  Trinitarian- 
ism  "  was  here  proclaimed  in  what  seemed  no  un- 
certain language.  In  all  the  addresses  the  real 
personal  Deity  of  Christ  was  made  the  central 
theme.  Mr.  Beecher's  doctrine  was  given  in  the 
following  extract :  "  Could  Theodore  Parker  wor- 
ship my  God?  Jesus  Christ  is  his  name.  All  that 
there  is  of  God  to  me  is  bound  up  in  that  name. 
A  dim  and  shadowy  effluence  rises  from  Christ, 
and  that  I  am  taught  to  call  the  Father.  A  yet 
more  tenuous  and  invisible  film  of  thought  arises, 
and  that  is  the  Holy  Spirit.  But  neither  is  to  me 
aught  tangible,  restful,  accessible/'  Dr.  Abbott 
also  quoted  from  Mr.  Beecher's  address  to  the 
London  ministers  :  "  Do  I  believe  in  the  divinity 
of  Christ?  I  do  not  believe  in  anything  else." 
"  There  is  nothing  else  to  me  when  I  am  thinking 
of  God."  Mr.  Beecher  was  a  man  of  extraordi- 
nary emotional  genius,  and  his  language  in  the 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  145 

heat  of  extemporaneous  speech  should  not  be  too 
critically  interpreted.  But  Dr.  Abbott  himself 
declared  that  "  the  heart  of  Mr.  Beecher's  teach- 
ing was  this :  that  Jesus  Christ  was  God  '  mani- 
fest in  the  flesh,'  "  and  significantly  added,  "  And 
what  Mr.  Beecher  held  and  this  church  holds  on 
this  subject,  I  hold  no  less  earnestly."  Now  cer- 
tainly nothing  can  be  plainer  than  Mr.  Beecher's 
meaning,  whatever  latitude  we  may  allow  to  his 
language.  He  held  that  Christ  was  very  God, 
and  that  the  whole  Godhead  was  incarnate  in  him. 
"  My  God  ?  Jesus  Christ  is  his  name."  And  this 
was  plainly  Dr.  Berry's  interpretation  of  Mr. 
Beecher's  views.  In  his  address  on  the  same  oc- 
casion he  said  that  Mr.  Beecher  drew  his  "doc- 
trine of  the  Deity  of  Jesus  Christ  from  his  own 
Christian  experience,"  on  which  basis  he  rested 
his  faith  in  the  incarnation,  since  it  was  "  obliga- 
tory for  God  to  come  to  man  and  work  for  him 
and  die  for  him."  The  bald  Patripassianism  of 
Dr.  Berry's  words  is  noticeable ;  but  it  is  a  just 
conclusion  from  Mr.  Beecher's  own  language,  and 
reveals  clearly  the  thorough  Patripassian  charac- 
ter of  the  "new  Trinitarianism."  Christ  is  no 
longer  the  incarnation  of  the  Son  of  God,  thej 
second  person  of  the  Trinity,  —  that  was  the  old/, 
Trinitarianism,  —  but  the  very  incarnation  of  God,)f; 
the  Father  Almighty,  the  Absolute  One.  The  dis- 
tinctions of  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  have 
faded  out.  God  in  his  own  single  person,  what- 
ever name  or  names  be  given  him,  Father,  Son,  or 


146        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Holy  Ghost,  God,  the  one  and  only  God,  "  came 
to  man,  worked  for  him,  and  died  for  him."  Thus 
Christ  is  all  the  Father  there  is,  as  well  as  Son 
and  Holy  Ghost.  AU  divinity  is  centred  and 
summed  up  in  him.  It  is  hardly  needful  to  say 
to  any  historical  scholar  that  all  this  "  new  Trini- 
tarianism"  is  no  trinitarianism  at  all.  It  is  sim- 
ply another  example  of  the  now  common  practice 
of  retaining  the  old  bottles  and  filling  them  with 
new  wine. 

The  theological  declarations  of  this  notable 
church  anniversary  are  the  more  significant,  be- 
cause they  have  been  published  in  book  form  and 
widely  read,  and  have  called  forth  little  dissent 
from  the  upholders  of  Trinitarianism,  and  it  is  my 
impression  that  this  type  of  belief  is  now  increas- 
ingly prevalent  in  the  New  England  Congrega- 
tional churches.  The  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  in 
its  ancient  Nicene  form  and  meaning  is  never 
preached.  The  very  phrase  "  three  persons  "  is 
passing  out  of  our  creeds  and  church  confessions. 
In  place  of  the  old  Trinitarianism,  with  Father, 
Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  as  three  distinct  personal 
beings  imited  by  community  of  nature,  yet  distin- 
guished by  an  essential  subordination,  the  Son 
and  Holy  Ghost  being  derived  from  the  Father 
and  possessing  all  their  divine  attributes  from  the 
Father  as  the  one  eternal  self-existent  fountain 
of  aU  being,  the  supreme  Deity  of  Christ  is  now 
pushed  to  the  front  and  made  the  great  test  of 
evangelical  faith.    In  short,  Trinitarianism  is  being  <^ 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  147 

^junitarianized.  One  person,  Christ,  has  become 
for  all  such  believers  the  one  only  God.  He  is 
God  incarnate.  The  Father  was  incarnate  in  him. 
The  Holy  Ghost,  as  Joseph  Cook  says,  is  only 
"  Christ's  continued  life.'* 

It  is  one  of  the  most  singular  facts  in  the  present 
theological  situation,  that  the  theologians  who  are 
the  stanchest  supporters  of  the  trinitarian  "  faith 
once  delivered,"  as  they  believe,  are  themselves 
drifting  directly  to  a  unitarian  form  of  heresy 
which  the  early  church  condenmed  and  cast  out. 
It  is  also  remarkable  that  these  persons  are  so  un- 
conscious of  what  this  new  Trinitarianism  involves. 
They  suppose  themselves  to  be  building  new  but- 
tresses of  the  old  trinitarian  dogma.  They  stoutly 
oppose  what  they  call  Unitarianism,  whatever  that 
may  mean.  They  are  ready  to  use  the  strongest 
trinitarian  language.  They  recite  the  Nicene 
creed,  and  baptize  in  the  name  of  Father,  Son, 
and  Holy  Ghost,  and  continually  repeat  the  trini- 
tarian benediction.  But  what  does  all  this  signify, 
if  they  read  into  all  these  forms  and  symbols  of 
the  ancient  faith  a  meaning  that  did  not  originally 
belong  to  them.  Their  dogma  of  Christ's  essential 
and  absolute  Deity  is  wholly  foreign  to  ancient 
orthodoxy.  It  is  the  old  heresy  revived  of  Patri- 
passian  Unitarianism.  Of  course  in  this  view  God 
is  one  personal  being,  and  if  Christ  is  God  incar- 
nate, and  as  such  is  the  one  personal  Deity,  what  be- 
comes of  the  Father,  —  the  one  absolute  and  unseen 
God  of  the  Old  Testament,  —  of  Christ  himseK,  and 


148        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

of  Paul  ?  He  is  reduced  to  a  metaphor,  a  shadow, 
of  which  Christ  the  Son  is  the  true  substance.  In 
such  a  doctrine,  not  only  Trinitarianism  but  even 
Monotheism  itself,  the  apostolic  basis  of  the 
Athanasian  trinity,  suffers  collapse.  Of  course 
the  reply  is  at  hand,  —  and  we  are  familiar  with 
it,  —  that  there  may  be  three  real  personal  distinc- 
tions, though  not  three  personal  beings  in  the  one 
being  of  God.  But  this  Sabellian  evasion  is  a 
pure  psychological  assumption  which  carries  a 
fallacy  on  its  very  face,  and  which  we  owe  to  the 
bold  ipse  dixit  of  the  great  Hopkinsian  Emmons. 
He  it  was  who  first  dared  to  declare  that  while 
"  it  is  evident  that  no  man  can  conceive  three 
divine  persons  to  be  one  person,  it  does  not  hence 
follow  that  no  man  can  conceive  that  three  divine 
persons  should  be  one  divine  Being,  i^or  if  we 
only  suppose  that  being  may  signify  something 
different  from  person  in  respect  to  Deity  (italics 
are  my  own),  then  we  can  easily  conceive  that  God 
should  be  but  one  Being  and  yet  exist  in  three 
persons."  Sure  enough,  how  easy !  ''''  If  we  only 
suppose  I "  But  can  we  "  suppose  "  ?  Is  not  a 
moral  being,  whether  he  be  man  or  God,  neces- 
sarily a  person?  Is  not  a  person  necessarily  a 
being?  But  Emmons,  as  we  have  already  seen, 
jumps  the  whole  logical  difficulty  and  assumes  his 
monstrous  supposition  to  be  an  actual  fact.  Per- 
haps the  most  amazing  thing  of  aU  is  that  men 
who  claim  to  be  consistent  thinkers  can  so  naively 
assume  such  a  patent  logical  fallacy  to  be  axio- 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  149 

matic  truth  in  respect  to  God.  The  simple 
truth  is  that  a  personal  triunity  is  a  Gordian 
knot  that  can  never  be  logically  untied,  and  can 
be  cut  only  by  the  sharp  sword  of  a  logical  para- 
dox. It  is  interesting  to  recall  the  fact  that  Car- 
dinal Newman,  whose  finely  spun  discriminations 
have  furnished  much  of  the  material  of  modem 
trinitarian  speculation,  frankly  allowed  the  truth 
of  this  view  of  the  case,  and  boldly  accepted  its 
consequence,  viz.,  that  there  are  three  persons  in 
one  personal  being,  or,  to  put  it  as  H.  B.  Smith 
and  Dorner  did,  that  there  are  three  persons  in 
one  personality ;  and  this  barefaced  logical  para- 
dox was  for  him  an  article  of  evangelical  faith. 
His  New  England  followers  are  only  saved  from  a 
similar  logical  dilemma  by  their  pantheistic  ten- 
dencies, from  which  Newman  was  apparently  free. 
I  have  dwelt  more  at  length  on  this  point  because 
it  represents  the  primary  and  cardinal  note  in  the 
present  stage  of  trinitarian  or  more  truly  unitarian 
evolution. 

The  second  notable  feature  of  the  Trinitarianism 
of  to-day  is  the  doctrine  of  the  consubstantiality 
or  community  of  essence  of  God  and  man.  This 
feature  has  a  close  affinity  with  the  Sabellian- 
Patripassian  one,  and  the  two  are  usually  found 
together.  Such  men  as  PhiUips  Brooks  and 
George  A.  Gordon,  who  have  been  prominent  in 
setting  forth  the  view  of  the  essential  divineness 
of  humanity,  and  who  base  on  it  their  doctrine  of 
Christ's    divinity,   are   clearly   Sabellian,   if    not 


150        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Patripassian,  in  their  doctrine  of  the  relation  of 
Christ  to  God ;  while  it  is  equally  true  that  such 
men  as  Lyman  Abbott,  who  more  directly  re- 
present the  Sabellian-Patripassian  position,  also 
accept  the  closely  affiliated  idea  of  man's  essential 
divineness  and  God's  essential  humanness.  Dr. 
Abbott  squarely  asserted  this  view  in  an  address 
lately  delivered  at  Bangor.  He  told  us  that  a 
theological  student  on  being  asked  :  "  Do  you 
think  the  divinity  of  Christ  differs  in  hind  or  in 
degree  from  the  divinity  in  man  ?  "  replied  :  "  In 
degree,'"  Dr.  Abbott  defended  this  reply.  "  There 
are  not  two  kinds  of  divinity,"  he  said.  "  We  are 
in  God's  image.  That  means  that  we  are  in  hind 
like  God.  We  are  children  of  God."  This  is, 
no  doubt,  a  good  gospel,  on  the  face  of  it,  and 
there  is  nothing  new  in  it.  The  newness  appears 
in  the  tacit  assumption  that  lies  behind  it,  viz.,  that 
if  man  is  in  hind  like  God,  he  is  therefore  truly 
and  essentially  divine,  in  other  words,  of  divine 
nature.  There  lurks  here  a  confusion  between 
moral  likeness  and  essential  likeness  which  dis- 
closes the  pantheistic  mode  of  thought  into  which 
our  modem  Trinitarianism  is  passing,  as  we  shall 
note  more  directly  soon.  The  Nicene  Trinitarian- 
ism held  to  Christ's  essential  likeness  to  God,  and 
so  declared  him  divine,  but  it  distinguished  Christ 
jfrom  mankind  by  holding  that  man's  likeness  to 
God  was  moral  rather  than  essential.  This  dis- 
tinction was  based  on  the  Platonic  dualism  which 
separated  the  imcreated  from  the  created  by  the 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  151 

broad  chasm  of  an  essential  difference.  This 
dualistic  view  made  Christ,  the  Son  of  God,  essen- 
tially different,  that  is,  different  in  kind,  from  men. 
But  monism  allows  no  such  chasm  between  the 
uncreated  and  the  created,  between  the  divine  and 
the  human,  between  God  and  man.  Such  is  the 
philosophical  background  of  the  new  Trinitarian- 
ism.  The  created  is  evolved  from  the  uncreated, 
and  is  of  the  same  essential  nature.  Man  is  as 
truly  divine  as  God  is.  "  There  are  not  two  kinds 
of  divinity."  Of  course  not.  The  real  question  is 
whether  the  one  kind  of  divinity  includes  man. 
Dr.  Abbott  says  Yes  just  as  plainly  as  PhiUips 
Brooks  or  Dr.  Gordon.  It  is  not  surprising  that 
these  two  apparently  distinct  schools  of  trinitarian 
thought  should  coalesce.  They  are  in  close  philo- 
sophical affinity,  and  their  partisans  are  united 
moreover  in  a  common  aim,  viz.,  to  save,  in  form 
at  least,  the  old  orthodox  Trinitarianism.  This 
aim  gives  the  true  clue  to  this  new  doctrine  of 
man's  consubstantiality  with  God.  Traditional 
trinitarian  orthodoxy  had  placed  the  centre  of 
Christ's  personality  in  his  divine  nature,  thus  re- 
ducing his  himaan  nature  to  a  sort  of  superficial 
appendix  of  the  divine,  and  destroying  its  real 
individuality.  Christ's  humanity  thus  became  a 
docetic  and  unmeaning  show.  How  could  it  be 
said  that  Christ  was  a  true  man,  with  real  human 
needs,  susceptibilities,  desires,  and  free  will,  involv- 
ing temptability  to  evil  and  sin,  so  that  it  could  be 
said  of  him  that  ^^he  was  tempted  in  all  points 


152        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITAKIANISM 

like  as  we  are,"  if  the  central  and  governing  prin- 
ciple of  his  personality  was  divine  and  so  raised 
above  all  changeableness  and  temptableness  ?  Such 
a  construction  of  Christ's  person  was  no  longer 
possible  in  these  days  of  historical  research  and 
criticism,  by  means  of  which  the  real  historical 
himian  Jesus,  so  long  lost  to  view,  has  been  once 
more  unveiled.  When  the  historical  facts  of 
Christ's  earthly  life  are  disentangled  from  the 
legendary  traditions  that  have  grown  up  around  it, 
there  is  clearly  revealed  in  his  human  nature  a 
human  will  central  and  regnant  over  his  whole 
being,  —  a  will  moved  by  human  motives,  affec- 
tions, interests,  appeals,  desires,  hopes,  aspirations, 
faith,  yes  by  human  fears  also,  sensitiveness  to 
suffering  and  weaknesses  of  the  flesh.  What 
more  touching  proof  of  all  this  than  that  scene  in 
Gethsemane !  Now  how  can  this  historical  picture 
of  Christ  be  accepted,  and  the  old  orthodoxy,  with 
its  doctrine  of  two  natures  and  two  wills,  divine 
and  human,  —  the  divine  ruling  the  human,  — 
remain  secure?  This  is  the  very  problem  that  the 
theory  of  man's  essential  divineness  seeks  to  solve. 
7  Man,  it  is  said,  is  consubstantial  with  Grod.  He 
I  is  essentially  divine,  for  he  is  in  the  divine  image. 
I  His  humanity  is  a  divine  humanity.  Every  man 
'  is  not  only  a  true  son  of  man,  but  also  a  true  son 
of  God.  But  supremely  was  this  true  of  Jesus, 
the  unique  representative  of  both  man  and  God. 
He  is  wholly  man  and  yet  wholly  God.  But  how 
is  this  amazing  assumption,  this  apparent  psycho- 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  163 

logical  contradiction,  to  be  explained  and  defended? 
The  answer  is :  There  is  in  God's  own  nature  an 
eternal  humanity  which  in  Christ  became  person- 
alized by  the  incarnation  and  so  was  made  mani- 
fest to  men.  And  here  again  the  interpolated 
phrase,  "  God  manifest  in  the  flesh,"  is  made  to 
do  duty,  and  lo  !  the  knot  has  been  successfully 
untied.  Christ  on  his  earthly  side  is  a  mere  man, 
unique  indeed,  but  none  the  less  a  true  son  of 
hmnanity,  while  in  his  heavenly  aspect  he  is  the 
absolute  and  eternal  God.  The  Sabellian  and 
pantheistic  character  of  this  solution  has  been 
already  pointed  out.  But  as  a  metaphysical  expla- 
nation of  Christ's  relation  to  the  Trinity  it  is  an 
utter  failiu*e,  for  it  leaves  clearly  exposed  to  view 
a  vast  unbridged  chasm  between  the  human  Jesus 
and  the  eternal  humanity  of  the  absolute  God 
which  even  the  befogging  speculations  of  old  or 
new  Hegelianism  are  unable  to  conceal. 

It  is  somewhat  difficult  to  decide  how  far  this 
idea  of  man's  divinity  has  penetrated  into  the  pop- 
ular mind  and  faith.  But  it  belongs  to  a  class  of 
ideas  that  is  more  and  more  permeating  the  very 
air  of  the  age.  Our  literature  is  steeped  with  it. 
Emerson  and  his  transcendental  school,  the  most 
potent  literary  factor  in  recent  thought,  have  done 
much  to  give  it  currency.  Still  further,  it  has 
close  affinity  with  the  reigning  scientific  monism 
which  is  rapidly  passing  from  science  to  philoso- 
phy, and  which  as  a  philosophic  principle  consti- 
tutes the  third  marked  feature  of  the  new  TrinitOr 
rianism  of  to-day. 


154        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Philosophical  monism  must  be  carefully  distin- 
guished from  scientific  monism.  The  latter  is 
limited  to  the  material  and  phenomenal  world,  the 
former  covers  the  whole  universe,  spiritual  as  well 
as  phenomenal.  Certainly  scientific  monism,  or 
the  doctrine  "  that  the  whole  cognizable  world  is 
constituted  and  has  been  developed  in  accordance 
with  one  common  fundamental  law,"  to  adopt  a 
definition  of  Haeckel,  is  the  greatest  discovery  of 
modern  natural  science,  and  any  religious  or  phi- 
losophical dogma  that  is  to  hold  its  ground  must 
not  only  reckon  with  it,  but  also  accept  its  con- 
clusions. But  while  this  is  true,  it  is  quite  another 
thing  to  extend  this  monistic  law  of  natural  evolu- 
tion over  the  spiritual  and  moral  as  well  as  natural 
world.  It  is  easy  to  see  at  once  that  the  conse- 
quences of  such  a  step  are  radical  and  momentous. 
If  the  whole  material  and  spiritual  universe  may 
be  reduced  to  one  ultimate  principle,  which  is  it : 
matter  or  mind?  Hence  two  classes  of  monists 
are  to  be  distinguished,  which  are  in  direct  antag- 
onism, viz.,  materialistic  monists  and  idealistic  or 
spiritual  monists.  Materialistic  monism,  as  a 
philosophical  and  not  merely  a  scientific  doctrine, 
holds  that  matter  is  the  first  principle  of  all  things 
out  of  which  are  evolved  even  the  highest  forms  of 
organic  life,  including  man's  intellectual  and  reli- 
gious nature.  Thus  the  "  soul  "  is  only  a  form  of 
matter,  "  a  function  of  the  brain,"  which  is  its 
material  base  and  organ.  The  difference  between 
the  human  soul  and  that  of  lower  animals  is  one 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  155 

of  degree  and  not  of  kind.  This  view  of  course 
involves  the  denial  of  the  soul's  separate  individual 
existence  after  the  death  of  the  body,  together  with 
aU  the  other  spiritual  dogmas  which  rest  upon  it. 
Haeckel's  "  Confession  of  Faith  of  a  Man  of  Sci- 
ence" is  a  conspicuous  example  of  materialistic 
philosophical  monism.  Of  course  most  students  of 
natural  science  adhere  closely  to  their  own  field  of 
Hbor  and  do  not  allow  themselves  to  cross  the  line 
which  separates  science  from  philosophy  and  reli- 
gion. But  it  is  difficult  if  not  impossible  to  pre- 
vent the  mind  from  philosophizing  on  the  facts  that 
are  brought  before  it.  Haeckel  declares  his  firm 
conviction  that  his  monistic  "  Confession  of  Faith  " 
"  is  shared  by  at  least  nine  tenths  of  the  men  of 
science  now  living,"  "  although  few  have  the 
courage  (or  the  need)  to  declare  it  openly." 
Whatever  the  truth  may  be  as  to  exact  numbers, 
the  trend  of  thought  and  belief  among  "men  of 
science  "  is  plainly  towards  philosophical  as  well 
as  scientific  monism,  —  such  men  as  Tyndall  and 
Huxley  and  Haeckel  being  the  more  outspoken 
representatives.  It  ought  to  be  noted  here  that 
materialistic  monism,  though  modem  in  its  present 
shape  and  lineage,  is  not  new  in  the  history  of 
philosophic  thought.  Greek  philosophy  began  on 
a  materialistic  monistic  basis  and  remained  such 
until  the  Socratic-Platonic  dualism  arose,  and  after- 
wards had  its  representatives  in  the  widespread 
and  popular  Stoic  and  Epicurean  schools.  In  fact, 
materialism  in  one  or  other  of  these  forms  was  the 


156        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

prevailing  religious  belief  during  the  golden  age 
of  the  Roman  empire,  —  the  period  from  Augustus 
to  Marcus  Aurelius. 

The  idealistic  monism  starts  from  the  opposite 
pole.  It  reduces  aU  things,  even  the  lowest  forms 
of  matter,  to  a  spiritual  substratum.  Matter  itself 
is  but  an  evolution  of  spirit.  Idea,  to  adopt  He- 
gelian language,  is  the  essence  of  the  universe. 
There  is  a  wonderful  charm  in  the  idealistic  phi- 
losophy, and  it  is  no  wonder  that  it  has  drawn  to 
itself  the  loftiest  and  noblest  spirits.  Man  loves 
to  disengage  himself  from  the  dull  round  of  earthly 
temporal  things  and  put  on  wings  with  Plato  and 
soar  upward  to  the  transcendental  and  eternal. 
Poetry  which  speaks  man's  highest  moods  and 
aspirations  is  idealistic  in  its  very  nature.  Words- 
worth, who  struck  the  keynote  of  the  most  splendid 
poetry  of  the  century,  theist  though  he  was  in 
faith,  is  ever  rising  into  that  heaven  of  idealistic 
vision  where  God  is  both  one  and  all,  as  in  the 
"  Excursion,"  in  a  passage  full  of  mystical  panthe- 
ism, from  which  I  quote  but  a  single  clause :  — 

"  Thou,  Thou  alone 
Art  everlasting",  and  the  blessed  Spirits, 
Which  Thou  includest,  as  the  sea  her  waves." 

But  idealism  has  its  weak  side.  There  are,  it  may 
be  said,  two  kinds  of  mind.  There  are  minds 
that  naturally  seek  facts,  the  facts  of  nature,  of 
history,  and  of  experience.  There  are  also  minds 
that  as  naturally  live  in  the  region  of  thought,  of 
the  abstract,  and  who  seek  to  project  out  of  the 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  167 

world  of  their  own  abstract  thinking  a  world  of 
concrete  realities.  Here  lies  the  great  danger  to 
which  idealistic  monism  is  exposed.  The  bridge 
from  the  abstract  to  the  concrete,  from  the  genus 
to  the  individual,  is  wholly  a  subjective  creation, 
and  can  never  be  made  the  objective  basis  of  a 
natural  evolution  from  idea  or  spirit  to  matter  and 
the  organic  material  world.  This  is  the  rock  on 
which  idealism  in  its  extreme  form  has  ever  split, 
from  Plato  and  Plotinus  to  Spinoza  and  Hegel. 
But  still  another  danger  lurks  in  a  monistic  ideal- 
ism. The  "  idea  "  of  Plato  was  not  individual  or 
personal,  it  was  a  universal,  and  his  highest  idea 
of  the  good  was  the  summum  genus.  So  the  abso- 
lute "  one  "  of  Plotinus  was  simply  the  highest 
point  of  abstraction  which  thought  could  reach. 
Plato  himself  was  a  religious  thinker,  but  his 
idealistic  philosophy  had  no  personal  God,  while 
Plotinus  was  a  consistent  and  avowed  pantheist. 
A  religious  idealist  may  attempt  to  hold  to  a  per- 
sonal God,  but  the  whole  tendency  of  this  philoso- 
phy will  be  quite  away  from  such  a  God  toward  a 
Platonic  Plotinian  abstraction.  Emerson's  criti- 
cism on  Christianity  well  sets  forth  the  natural 
attitude  of  monistic  idealism  toward  personality  as 
an  element  of  being,  and  especially  of  the  high- 
est form  of  being,  God.  "  Christianity,"  he  says, 
"  is  an  exaggeration  of  the  personal,  the  positive, 
the  ritual.  It  has  dwelt,  it  dwells,  with  noxious 
exaggeration  about  the  person  of  Jesus.  The 
soul  knows  no  persons,^ ^     What  now  of  the  new 


158        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

trinitarian  monism  of  our  day  ?  Of  course  it  is 
idealistic  to  the  core.  Against  the  materialism  of 
Tyndall  and  Haeckel  and  others  it  holds  to  the 
doctrine  of  the  eternal  priority  of  spirit  to  matter 
and  to  the  radical  generic  difference  between  them. 
Spirit  is  the /bns  et  origo  of  all  material  things, 
and  yet  never  to  be  confounded  with  them.  This 
view  might  take  a  dualistic  form.  Matter  might 
be  treated  as  a  creation  of  mind,  having  a  begin- 
ning in  time,  and  belonging  to  an  entirely  distinct 
realm  of  being.  Mind,  too,  might  be  regarded  as 
eternally  personal,  and  as  existing  only  in  persons 
as  personal  substances  or  individuals.  Such  is  the 
Biblical  theistic  dualism.  But  certainly  the  fore- 
most representatives  of  the  new  Trinitarianism  are 
not  dualists.  They  hold  to  one  eternal  spiritual 
substance  in  whatever  form  it  may  appear,  and  it 
is  on  this  ground  that  they  assert  the  true  divinity 
of  man  and  the  true  humanity  of  God.  Dr. 
Whiton  did  not  speak  for  himself  alone  when  he 
said  :  "  There  is  but  one  spiritual  nature,  and  that 
may  be  indifferently  spoken  of  as  divine  or  human. 
The  universal  God  is  individualized  in  each  per- 
sonal conscience."  That  is,  personality  is  but  an 
accident,  or  quality  of  substance,  so  that  impersonal 
substance  rises  higher  than  personal  substance  in 
the  scale  of  being.  The  eternal  evolution  is  from 
the  impersonal  to  the  personal.  This  surely  is 
nothing  less  than  a  monistic  pantheism  so  far  as 
the  spiritual  world  is  concerned.  Whether  now  a 
spiritual  monistic  philosophy  will  or  can  stop  here 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  169 

is  the  question.  At  this  point  dualism  might  still 
attempt  to  assert  itself.  There  are  two  separate 
worlds,  it  might  be  said,  and  two  separate  evolu- 
tions, a  spiritual  evolution  and  a  material  one. 
But  can  this  be  true  ?  Are  there  two  evolutionary- 
forces  in  the  so-called  universe  ?  Is  the  universe 
after  all  not  a  universe,  but  a  duality,  with  dual 
forces  and  laws  ?  We  know  what  science  says  to 
this,  so  far  as  it  can  speak.  What  shall  philosophy 
say?  Between  the  brain  and  the  mind  what  is 
there  ?  The  end  of  one  form  of  evolution  and  the 
beginning  of  another  ?  Does  a  new  force  here 
enter  that  before  had  no  activity  or  agency,  and 
begin  a  new  order  of  life  ?  A  negative  answer  of 
course  brings  us  to  the  verge  of  absolute  pantheism. 
And  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  is  the  logical 
result  of  either  form  of  monism,  whether  material- 
istic or  idealistic.  Both  reach  at  last  the  same 
pantheistic  goal,  though  by  opposite  roads,  and  with 
opposite  views  of  that  original  force  which  by  cour- 
tesy on  both  sides  is  called  God.  Plainly  orthodox 
theologians  are  not  wholly  imaware  of  the  end 
toward  which  monism  leads  and  are  chary  about 
going  too  far  in  that  direction.  They  wish  to  pre- 
serve the  form  of  the  old  dualism  though  its  sub- 
stance is  taken  away.  We  hear  about  the  "  new 
theism,"  as  if  there  could  be  two  kinds  of  theism 
any  more  than  there  can  be  two  kinds  of  persons, 
or  two  kinds  of  divinity,  and  as  if  baptizing  any- 
thing with  the  Christian  name  could  alter  its  pagan 
nature.     For  the  monism  of  Augustine  and  of  his 


160        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

theological  descendants  down  to  the  present  day  is 
radically  different  from  the  theism  of  Paul  and 
Athanasius,  and  is  not  of  Christian,  but  of  pagan 
New  Platonic,  ancestry,  as  the  previous  chapters 
have  shown. 

The  same  fear  of  an  avowed  pantheism  is  seen 
in  the  fine  distinctions  that  are  so  frequently  made 
between  the  divine  transcendence  and  the  divine 
immanence.  Theologians  are  trying  to  hold  both 
and  thus  play  fast  and  loose  with  both.  For  these 
two  terms,  in  their  true  philosophical  significance, 
are  as  opposed  to  each  other  as  dualism  and  monism, 
and  can  no  more  be  harmonized.  Dualism  is 
based  on  the  divine  transcendence  as  monism  is 
based  on  the  divine  immanence,  and  these  two 
principles  of  explanation  of  the  universe  remain  in 
everlasting  antithesis,  like  the  two  great  schools 
of  Greek  thought  that  represent  them,  the  Pla- 
tonic and  the  Stoic.  Yet  men  ring  the  changes 
on  transcendence  and  immanence,  as  Coleridge  did 
on  "  subject  and  object,"  as  if  they  could  save  them- 
selves by  such  subjective  distinctions  from  the  open 
pit  of  pantheism,  on  the  precipitous  verge  of  which 
they  stand  and  into  which  they  are  ready  any 
moment  to  fall.  I  am  well  aware  how  strong  is 
the  recoil  of  man's  religious  nature  from  such  a 
result,  and  there  are  clear  indications  of  it  in  our 
most  recent  theological  literature.  But  the  stream 
must  be  as  the  fountain,  and  monism,  if  accepted 
and  followed  as  a  philosophical  principle,  has  but 
one  sure  terminus,  —  the  undisguised  and  complete 
pantheism  of  Spinoza  and  Hegel. 


THE  TRINITARIAN  OUTLOOK  161 

I  have  protracted  this  preliminary  resume  to 
what  may  seem  an  unnecessary  length.  But  it  is 
absolutely  essential  to  have  the  foundations  of  an 
historical  outlook  into  the  future  firmly  laid.  Let 
it  be  noted,  as  we  leave  this  part  of  our  subject, 
that  these  three  principal  tendencies,  viz.,  1.  Sa- 
bellian-Patripassianism,  2,  man's  consubstantiality 
with  God,  3,  a  monistic  philosophy,  are  organi- 
cally related  and  supported,  and  it  is  only  by  a 
careful  analysis  that  they  can  be  distinguished. 
They  stand  or  fall  together,  and  really  unite  what 
may  seem  to  be  different  trinitarian  positions  on 
essentially  common  ground. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  TEINITAEIAN  BESULT 

We  are  now  ready  to  look  around  us  and  ask 
ourselves  the  meaning  and  portent  of  those  phases 
and  changeful  attitudes  of  trinitarian  thought 
which,  like  a  panorama,  are  passing  before  our 
eyes.  The  survey  makes  several  clear  impres- 
sions. 

One  observes  at  once  the  vague,  fluxive,  uncer- 
tain, and  restless  character  of  present  trinitarian 
speculation.  There  seems  to  be  no  firm  footing 
for  theological  positions.  Trinitarianism,  as  a 
theological  basis  of  faith,  is  like  a  ship  at  sea, 
tempest-tossed,  and  seeking  some  new  haven  of 
rest.  Ask  men  what  Trinitarianism  to-day  is  and 
they  cannot  tell  you,  or  if  they  do,  they  will  dis- 
agree at  once.  Orthodoxy  once  presented  a  solid 
front,  known  and  read  of  all  men.  Not  so  to-day. 
The  definitions  of  orthodoxy,  even  by  orthodox 
men,  are  "  as  thick  as  leaves  in  Vallombrosa." 
Orthodoxy  has  at  last  come  to  be  each  man's  doxy. 
The  natural  result  has  followed.  The  ranks  of 
orthodoxy  are  becoming  demoralized.  There  is 
no  one  banner  under  which  all  can  rally,  no  real 
leadership,  no  common  bond  of  union.     The  old 


THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  163 

lines  of  demarcation  between  orthodoxy  and  hete- 
rodoxy are  fading  out  in  the  minds  of  men,  and 
when  the  old  shibboleths  and  war-cries  are  sounded 
there  is  no  general  united  response.  Moreover  the 
effort  to  find  a  new  basis  of  union  has  hitherto 
failed.  New  creeds  are  being  made,  but  there  is 
no  universal  acceptance  of  them.  New  forms  of 
trinitarian  statement  are  continually  being  pro- 
mulgated, but  men  criticise  them  or  give  them  no 
heed.  The  outcome  of  it  all  is  that  orthodoxy  has 
grown  timid  and  wary,  and  hides  itself.  The  old 
bottles  of  traditional  creeds  and  dogmas  are  still 
used  and  the  old  labels  are  suffered  to  remain, 
while  the  new  wine  of  a  new  Trinitarianism,  which 
is  not  the  old  at  all,  is  poured  into  them.  Creeds 
are  now  signed  for  "  substance  of  doctrine,"  when 
the  substance  is  the  very  question  at  issue. 

On  so  grave  a  matter  I  wish  to  speak  within 
bounds.  It  is  more  and  more  true,  as  I  am  ready 
to  affirm,  of  our  younger  ministers  especially,  that 
they  preach  honestly  and  boldly  the  gospel  as  they 
believe  it.  They  are  learning  to  prize  their  Pro- 
testant and  Puritan  birthright.  But  it  must  still 
be  said  that  the  pulpit,  and  the  religious  press, 
largely  edited  by  ministers,  have  so  long  borne  the 
yoke  of  dogmatic  bondage  that  they  have  to  a  con- 
siderable degree  lost  the  true  sense  of  what  bond- 
age and  liberty  mean.  There  are  exceptions  to  all 
rules.  No  doubt  there  are  not  a  few  splendid  ex- 
ceptions to  this  one.  I  have  a  confident  hope  that 
the  exceptions  will  erelong  become  the  rule,  and 


164        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

that  this  sad  phase  of  theological  timidity  will  van- 
ish in  the  new  era  of  intellectual  and  moral  free- 
dom. But  it  cannot  pass  away  completely  so 
long  as  the  causes  of  it  continue  to  work.  These 
causes  are  connected  with  the  supremacy  of  the 
dogmatic  spirit ;  and  though  this  spirit  is  rapidly 
yielding  to  the  scientific  temper  and  methods  of 
our  day,  it  is  stiU  to  be  reckoned  with,  as  recent 
ecclesiastical  events  show.  This  spirit  lives  in  the 
dogmatic  theological  standards  set  up  as  condi- 
tions of  entrance  into  the  Christian  ministry,  in- 
dependently of  intellectual  and  religious  fitness, 
also  in  the  dogmatic  creeds  imposed  on  theological 
instructors  in  some,  if  not  all,  of  our  seminaries, 
and  stiU  more  in  the  inquisitorial  character  of 
councils  sometimes  called  to  investigate  charges 
of  theological  error.  The  effects  of  this  dogmatism 
faU  with  especial  weight  upon  ministers,  and  it  is 
no  wonder  that  not  a  few  of  them,  whose  daily 
bread  for  themselves  and  their  families  may  de- 
pend on  a  reputation  for  orthodoxy,  are  more  or 
less  unconsciously  governed  by  a  wholesome  fear 
that  serves  to  cramp  their  intellectual  freedom  and 
to  breed  a  timid  and  craven  spirit.  This  is  the 
explanation  in  part  of  the  fact  that  the  laity  are 
so  much  in  advance  of  the  clergy  in  their  readiness 
to  accept  whatever  new  light  and  truth  may  come 
from  the  new  science  and  history,  and  to  lay  aside 
traditional  dogmas  that  are  found  to  be  without 
historical  foundation.  Of  course  there  are  excep- 
tions among  the  laity,  as  among  the  clergy.    Some 


THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  165 

laymen  are  stiU  bound  in  dogmatic  fetters,  as  there 
are  some  clergymen  who  have  broken  them  utterly. 
Let  me  not  here  be  misunderstood.  I  am  not 
deahng  with  individuals,  but  with  laws  of  tendency 
and  their  natural  results.  Some  of  our  most  con- 
servative ministers  are  filled  with  the  spirit  of 
Christian  freedom  and  tolerance,  and  so  there  are 
men  of  the  most  pronounced  radicalism  who  are  as 
dogmatic  as  Calvin  himself.  But  history  shows 
that,  as  a  rule,  the  dogmatic  spirit  develops  intol- 
erance and  spiritual  despotism.  Conservatism  and 
dogmatism  are  not  necessarily  connected,  as  exam- 
ples prove,  though  they  have  too  often  been  found 
together.  The  fact  remains  that  causes  always 
work  out  their  natural  effects,  and  that,  while  the 
reign  of  dogma  is  suffered  to  continue,  its  baneful 
results  will  inevitably  follow. 

The  situation  thus  sketched  gives  a  clue  to  one 
of  the  most  remarkable  features  of  it,  viz.,  the 
general  and  combined  effort  on  the  part  of  the  ex- 
ponents of  the  new  Trinitarianism  to  make  as  clear 
and  wide  as  possible  the  difference  between  Trini- 
tarianism and  Unitarianism.  It  is  a  curious  phe- 
nomenon, and  well  worth  a  careful  study  by  the 
historical  observer,  for  it  sheds  a  bright  light  on 
the  anomalous  condition  into  which  trinitarian 
orthodoxy  has  fallen.  What  is  the  great  task  now 
assumed  by  trinitarian  apologies  and  polemics? 
Not  plainly  to  set  forth  in  all  its  grand  outlines 
the  ancient  dogma  of  the  Trinity,  but  rather  a 
^^uew  Trinitarianism,"  and  in  doing  this  to  show 


166        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

that  it  has  no  affinity  with  Unitarianism.  But  why 
the  need  of  showing  this?  Simply  because  the 
line  of  difference  is  becoming  so  dim  that  it  re- 
quires a  keen  microscopic  eye  to  discern  it.  In 
theological  controversy,  as  in  war  always,  the  storm 
centre  is  where  the  lines  of  battle  run  most  closely 
together.  Our  previous  resume  has  shown  how  all 
recent  trinitarian  tendencies  run  straight  toward  a 
unitarian  result.  Monism  is  unitarianism  in  es- 
sence though  it  may  take  on  all  the  colors  of  the 
chameleon.  When  all  the  old  bottles  with  their 
disguises  have  been  broken  and  all  the  mystical 
idealistic  pantheism  has  been  stripped  off,  there 
remains  essential  unitarianism.  The  case  is  a 
strange  one.  Trinitarians  and  Unitarians  to-day 
hold  the  same  philosophical  position.  Both  parties 
are  monists.  In  truth,  as  we  have  seen,  it  was 
from  the  Unitarian  Emerson  that  such  Trinitarians 
as  Phillips  Brooks  and  others  drew  the  weapons  of 
their  new  philosophic  trinitarian  gospel.  Our  pre- 
liminary survey  also  showed  how  organically  con- 
nected are  all  the  three  fundamental  elements  of 
the  trinitarian  position.  The  unity  of  God,  of  man, 
and  of  the  universe  is  at  its  very  root.  This  is 
essential  unitarianism,  to  be  sure ;  and  wherein  is 
the  Unitarian  position  different  ?  Let  some  skilled 
logician  arise  to  show.  "  But,"  says  the  trinitarian 
apologist,  "the  Unitarianism  against  which  we 
wage  Christian  war  is  not  the  doctrine  of  the  per- 
sonal unity  of  God,  in  which  of  course  we  all  now 
agree,  but  the  Unitarian  denial  of  the  Godhood  of 


THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  167 

Christ."  Here  indeed  is  one  of  the  old  bottles  of 
the  ancient  theology.  Let  us  examine  the  new 
wine  it  contains.  It  may  not  be  so  different  from 
the  Unitarian  wine  after  all.  The  doctrine  of  the 
Nicene  creed  concerning  the  Godhood  of  Christ 
was  this  :  There  is  one  only  absolute  eternal  God, 
the  Father  Almighty ;  and  besides  there  is  the  Son. 
of  God,  a  second  hypostasis  or  personal  being,  who 
is  of  common  nature  with  the  Father,  but  derived 
and  subordinate,  "  very  God  of  very  God  "  indeed, 
but  not  absolute  or  seK-existent,  though  timeless 
by  eternal  generation ;  and  further  there  is  a  third 
hypostasis,  the  Holy  Ghost.  But  what  is  the  new 
wine  that  is  now  being  dispensed  out  of  the  old 
flask  with  its  old  triuitarian  label?  This:  that 
God  is  one  only  both  in  person  and  in  essence,  but 
is  manifested  in  different  forms,  and  especially  in 
triune  form,  and  that  this  triune  form  has  become 
incarnate  in  Jesus  Christ,  who  is  thus  God  mani- 
fest in  the  flesh,  so  that  the  whole  Godhood  is  in 
Christ,  and  there  is  none  other  beside  him.  What, 
no  Father?  No,  except  as  in  him.  No  Holy 
Ghost  ?  No,  not  outside  of  Christ.  Christ  is  the 
whole  God;  Fatherhood,  Sonhood,  and  Spirithood 
are  simply  forms  of  Christ's  one  Godhood.  "  But 
we  are  Trinitarians,"  they  say.  "  We  recite  the 
Nicene  creed."  Yes,  but  you  do  not  mean  by  it 
what  the  Nicene  Fathers  meant.  Your  Father, 
Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  are  but  shadows  of  one  real 
Deity,  and  that  one  Deity  is  summed  up  and  mani- 
fested in  Jesus  Christ.     The  theism  and  trinitari- 


168        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

anism  of  the  creed  has  departed  and  in  its  place 
we  have  the  Patripassian  monism  of  to-day.  I  hear 
indeed  one  voice  as  if  in  protest.  Dr.  Abbott, 
with  his  usual  wariness,  in  the  address  already 
referred  to,  said:  "I  never  say  that  Christ  is 
God,  because  God  is  more  than  the  sum  of  all  his 
manifestations.  Jesus  Christ  is  one  of  the  mani- 
festations of  God.  Therefore  God  is  more  than 
Jesus  Christ.  Jesus  Christ  is  God  manifest  in  the 
flesh."  This  is  shrewd,  but  is  it  sound  ?  If  Christ 
is  God  manifest  in  the  flesh,  not  in  a  figure  but  in 
reality,  does  the  manifestation  take  away  from  his 
full  Godhood  ?  Was  the  incarnation  a  lessening 
of  divinity,  or  not  rather  an  adding  of  humanity  ? 
The  latter,  said  the  orthodox  letter  of  Leo.  But 
Dr.  Abbott  makes  the  incarnation,  in  which  he  de- 
clared distinctly  that  he  believed,  a  limiting  of 
God.  God  pre-incamate  is  so  much  greater  than 
God  incarnate  that  the  latter  should  not  be  called 
God  at  all.  Further,  if  Christ  is  only  one  of  many 
manifestations  of  God,  such  as  those  in  man  and 
in  nature  and  in  history,  how,  but  by  an  utter 
subversion  of  language,  can  Christ  be  called  God  at 
all?  How  is  he  "  God  manifest  in  the  flesh  "  any 
more  than  he  is  God  alone,  or  than  a  man  or  a 
mountain  is  God?  Let  Dr.  Abbott  answer  for 
himself.  But  what  I  have  to  say  to  all  this  is 
that  I  commend  Dr.  Abbott  to  a  re-reading  of  his 
Plymouth  Church  anniversary  address,  and  to  a 
harmonizing  of  the  two  addresses.  And  if  they 
cannot  be  harmonized,  as  I  suspect  is  the  case, 
which  of  the  addresses  speaks  true  ? 


THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  169 

But  to  return  to  the  real  point  at  issue,  what  is 
the  difference  between  the  "  new  Trinitarianism  " 
and  Unitarianism  ?  Here  we  must  note  the  fact 
that  there  are  two  kinds  also  of  historical  Unitari- 
anism, an  old  and  a  new.  The  old  Unitarianism 
was  simply  monotheism,  like  the  faith  of  the  Old 
Testament  and  of  Jesus  himseK.  It  reappeared  in 
New  England  in  protest  against  trinitarian  ortho- 
doxy in  the  persons  of  Channing  and  Theodore 
Parker.  Much  of  it,  I  suppose,  exists  to-day  be- 
hind the  unitarian  christological  humanitarianism. 
The  new  Unitarianism  is  monistic  with  aU  its  Em- 
ersonian, idealistic,  pantheistic  features.  It  makes 
much  of  man's  divineness  and  of  God's  humanness. 
It  is  thus  ready  to  exalt  Christ  to  a  imique  divinity. 
It  goes  back  to  the  Nicene  creed,  and  declares  its 
only  defect  to  be  one  of  limitation.  The  Nicene 
doctrine  of  the  consubstantiality  of  Christ  with 
God  should  have  been  enlarged  to  that  of  the 
divine  consubstantiality  of  all  men.  I  hold  no 
brief  for  any  of  these  dogmas,  but  I  venture  to 
affirm  that  the  new  Unitarian  leaders  are  quite 
ready  to  accept  much  of  the  language  of  their  Trin- 
itarian opponents,  and  even  to  assert  the  true  God- 
hood  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  in  the  monistic  sense  of 
the  term ;  and  if  so,  what  point  of  philosophical 
difference  is  left  between  the  new  Trinitarianism 
and  the  new  Unitarianism  ?  Surely  Trinitarianism 
Las  been  unitarianized  or  Unitarianism  has  been 
trinitarianized.  Which  ?  A  common  monistic  phi- 
losophy gives  the  only  possible  answer.     Both  sec- 


170        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tions  of  Christian  monism  agree  in  these  points : 
that  the  supreme  Deity  is  absohite  essence,  whether 
personal  or  impersonal  it  is  not  easy  to  say ;  that 
Christ's  divinity  is  not  different  in  kind  from  aU 
divinity;  and  that  as  an  incarnate  person  he  is 
purely  human,  with  a  human  birth  and  a  historical 
beginning  in  time.  With  such  radical  agreements, 
to  talk  about  differences  is  to  beat  the  air.  Is  it 
insisted  that  there  remains  a  real  difference  on  the 
question  of  Christ's  Deity?  Pray  show  us  just 
what  it  is.  Deity,  divinity,  godhood,  are  words  of 
elastic  meaning  in  theology,  especially  in  monistic 
theology.  The  real  question  at  issue,  a  question, 
however,  which  orthodoxy  is  continually  brushing 
aside  as  irrelevant,  is  not  whether  Jesus  Christ  is 
divine,  but  whether  he  is  human.  The  old  Nicene 
orthodoxy  begged  this  question  and  finally  vir- 
tually denied  it.  The  new  orthodoxy  squarely 
affirms  it,  but  arrays  Christ's  manhood  in  the 
vesture  of  godhood.  But  what  is  the  metaphysical 
or  historical  background  of  this  human-divine 
person?  Is  it  an  eternal  personal  being,  or  a 
human  child  of  Joseph  and  Mary?  In  other 
words,  was  the  personal  consciousness  of  Jesus 
an  eternal  divine  consciousness  of  the  absolute 
God,  involving  omniscience  and  other  divine  attri- 
butes, or  was  it  a  human  consciousness  involving 
limitation  and  defect  and  weakness  ?  There  can 
be  no  doubt  as  to  the  answer  of  the  "new  Trini- 
tarianism."  It  is  the  same  with  that  of  the  new 
Unitarianism.     The  real  personal  centre  of  Jesus 


THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  171 

is  his  human  consciousness  and  will,  not  the 
eternal  omniscient  consciousness  and  will  of  a  per- 
sonal God.  Godhood  thus  becomes  but  a  figure 
of  speech,  or  a  transcendental  universal  of  Plo- 
tinian-Hegelian  metaphysics,  and  one  may  choose 
between  them.  The  doctrine  of  divine  humanity 
and  human  divinity  makes  the  choice  both  easy 
and  non-essential.  The  term  God  has  always  had 
a  large  and  springing  meaning  in  the  history  of 
language.  Even  the  Bible,  with  all  its  stiff  mo- 
notheism, describes  men  as  gods,  and  sons  of 
gods,  as  in  one  of  the  Psalms,  "  I  have  said  ye 
are  gods,  and  all  of  you  are  children  of  the 
Most  High,"  and  Christ  is  made  in  the  fourth 
Gospel  to  defend  himself  against  the  charge  of 
blasphemy  in  calling  himself  the  Son  of  God,  by 
quoting  this  very  passage.  Only  add  now  to  a 
figure  of  speech  a  monistic  philosophy,  and  it  is 
equally  easy  for  a  Trinitarian  or  a  Unitarian  to 
assert  Christ's  Deity.  And  yet  this  is  the  curious 
historical  fact,  that  these  two  positions,  inexorably 
united  by  common  philosophical  and  theological 
principles,  are  arrayed  against  each  other  in  solemn 
internecine  conflict,  and  the  worst  heretical  charge 
that  can  be  brought  against  any  one  in  the  com- 
munion of  Trinitarian  saints  to-day  is  that  he  is 
somehow,  one  hardly  knows  how,  a  Unitarian.  To 
such  a  barren,  nay,  absurd  result  has  the  present 
phase  of  Trinitarianism  come  ! 

One  cannot  refrain  from   calling  attention  at 
this  point  in  our  survey  to  the  illustration  here 


172        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

afforded  of  a  striking  fact  in  the  history  of  theo- 
logical dogmas,  viz.,  that  the  shibboleths  of  ortho- 
doxy are  constantly  changing  with  the  changing 
circumstances  of  the  times.  The  heresy  of  one 
age  is  the  orthodoxy  of  another,  and  vice  versa. 
Only  a  few  years  ago  the  burning  question  of 
theological  disputation  in  New  England  was  the 
theory  of  a  new  or  second  probation  of  certain 
classes  of  men.  To  assert  it  became  for  a  while 
the  very  storm  centre  of  heresy.  Licensure  of 
young  ministers  was  made  to  hang  largely  on  the 
answers  given  to  questions  concerning  this  obscure 
point  of  eschatology.  Another  similar  eschatolo- 
gical  question  was  also  pushed  to  the  front :  that 
of  the  everlastingness  of  future  punishment.  On 
such  points  the  American  Board  came  near  dis- 
ruption. It  is  interesting  to  observe  how  rapidly 
the  whole  problem  of  eschatology,  so  far  as  the 
final  state  of  men  is  concerned,  is  passing  out  of 
sight.  If  such  matters  are  brought  forward  in 
ministerial  examinations,  the  interest  is  specula- 
tive rather  than  dogmatic.  Licensure  is  no  longer 
made  to  hang  on  it.  In  the  last  generation  Cal- 
vinism was  regnant,  and  any  taint  of  Arminianism 
in  the  form  of  asserting  free  wiU  or  contingency 
was  quickly  caught  up  and  vigorously  dealt  with. 
Dr.  Emmons,  the  Corypheus  of  Hopkinsian  Cal- 
vinism, came  very  near  being  refused  licensure 
in  his  youth,  because  he  used  rather  stronger 
language  on  "natural  ability"  than  the  examin- 
ing ministers  were  willing  to  allow,  though  they 


OK 

THE  TRINITARIAN  RESULT  ^'^W^LfFOfJ 

adopted  the  very  same  phrase.  But  at  that  time 
"  natural  ability  "  was  the  one  great  watchword  of 
orthodoxy.  To-day  such  a  question  would  only 
excite  amusement.  We  are  far  beyond  Calvinism 
or  eschatology.  The  historical  cycle  has  run  out, 
and  we  are  back  once  more  at  the  point  where 
Christian  history  began, — the  first  stage  in  the 
evolution  of  Christian  theology,  viz.,  the  question 
of  the  man  of  Nazareth.  Who  is  he  ?  And  that 
question  has  been  evolved  to  its  final  answer,  that 
Jesus  is  God,  the  only  highest  God.  It  is  no 
longer  the  historical  question  of  his  birth,  life, 
character,  teaching,  and  moral  power  over  the  men 
of  his  own  generation,  but  rather  the  subtlest  phi- 
losophical question  that  human  thought  can  raise, 
that  of  the  metaphysical  relation  of  the  human 
Jesus  to  the  absolute  Deity,  and  the  answer  to 
this  question  is  made  the  test  of  evangelical  faith. 
The  young  minister  may  be  at  his  ease  as  to  his 
theological  system  besides,  if  he  can  only  give  as 
his  own  the  "new  trinitarian"  version  of  Christ's 
true  Godhood.     Thus  history  has  its  revenges. 

But  what  next  ?  we  are  now  ready  to  ask  our- 
selves ;  for  the  historical  evolution  of  dogmas,  as 
of  all  things  else,  ever  moves  on.  And  here  the 
historical  observer  finds  himself  at  a  point  of  view 
where  what  has  seemed  confused  and  perplexing 
begins  to  shape  itseK  into  order  and  unity.  For 
one  thing  grows  clear,  that  the  phase  of  trinitarian 
evolution  which  we  have  been  surveying  is  fast 
reaching  its  climax,  and  cannot  move  much  fur- 


174        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

» 

ther  on  its  present  line  of  progress.  The  old 
order  is  ending  and  a  new  order  must  begin. 
The  trinitarian  dogma  has  swung  round  the  whole 
circle  and  returned  to  its  initial  starting-point, 
and,  further,  its  philosophical  as  well  as  historical 
Evolution  has  already  attained  its  logical  terminus. 
When  Sabellianism  has  become  Patripassianism, 
and  Patripassianism  has  been  metamorphosed  into 
philosophical  monism,  there  remains  but  one  more 
step  to  take,  juggle  with  it  as  one  may,  and  that 
step  is  ultimate  pantheism.  Evolution  on  this 
line  is  forever  stopped.  The  cycle  has  run  out. 
Let  us  consider.  What  step  further  can  the 
dogma  of  Christ's  Deity  take  ?  Already  Christ 
has  become  the  whole  Godhead.  His  very  hu- 
manity has  been  completely  divinized.  For  is  not 
man  himself  consubstantial  with  God?  Another 
stage  of  evolution  in  this  direction  is  impossible. 
All  that  can  be  done  is  to  carry  out  with  logical 
consistency  the  monistic  principle  already  accepted, 
and  boldly  say  that  the  incarnation  is  but  a  meta- 
phor, or  applies  equally  to  aU  men ;  that  miracu- 
lous birth  is  no  miracle  at  all  except  as  aU  birth 
is  a  marvel,  as  in  truth  it  is ;  that  resurrection  and 
ascension  and  second  coming  are  but  parts  of  apo- 
calyptic imagery,  except  so  far  as  it  is  true  that 
for  all  men  there  is  to  be  revival  and  resurrection 
to  immortal  life,  and  final  gathering  together  to 
an  endless  assize  and  retribution.  And  all  this  is 
being  said  already.  But  the  evolution  must  move 
on,  if  not  in  this  channel,  then  in  some  other. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   NEW   HISTORICAL   EVOLUTION 

We  have  reached  a  turning-point  in  our  survey 
of  great  significance.  Little  as  we  may  realize  it, 
this  age  in  which  we  happen  to  be  living  is  the 
theatre  in  which  is  being  enacted  the  most  radical 
and  the  greatest  epochal  movement  that  history 
has  yet  recorded.  To  read  its  meaning  aright  and 
so  be  able  to  forecast  in  some  measure  its  issues, 
it  is  necessary  to  understand  the  different  ways  in 
which  the  principle  of  historical  evolution  works. 
It  has  three  distinct,  though  cooperative,  laws  of 
action  :  1.  The  law  of  development.  2.  The  law 
of  cycles  and  of  cyclic  changes.  3.  The  law  of 
reaction  and  revolution.  Let  me  explain,  and 
illustrate,  from  the  history  of  Christian  dogma. 
"Development"  is  a  term  that  is  often  used  sy- 
nonymously with  "  evolution,"  but  the  latter  has  a 
wider  significance.  Development  is  the  primary 
and  ordinary  law  by  which  all  evolution  works. 
But  at  certain  crises  this  law  is  suspended,  and  a 
cyclic  change  occurs,  and  a  new  form  of  evolution 
begins.  This  is  seen  in  nature.  Its  history  began 
with  inorganic  materials.  Then  came  a  change  to 
organic  life.     The  cycle  of  the  azoic  ends,  and  a 


176        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

new  cycle  of  the  protozoic  begins.  The  evolution- 
ary movement  continues,  but  under  a  new  form. 
A  new  force  has  entered  into  nature,  producing  a 
new  and  higher  result.  So  in  the  passage  from 
the  lower  to  the  higher  forms  of  organized  life, 
from  vegetable  to  fish,  from  fish  to  reptile,  and 
from  reptile  to  mammal.  But  in  the  evolution 
from  mammal  to  man  the  cycle  of  brute  life  is 
succeeded  by  the  new  cycle  of  human  beings  with 
reason  and  conscience  and  free  will,  and  capacity 
of  speech  and  of  religion.  All  this  we  may  read, 
as  in  a  book,  in  the  science  of  geology,  where  in 
the  different  strata  of  the  rocks  we  may  see  the 
new  cycles  of  change  that  divide  one  stage  of 
development  from  another.  The  same  is  true  of 
history.  The  law  of  development  began  to  work 
at  once  in  the  history  of  the  dogma  of  Christ.  A 
new  cycle  began  with  the  introduction  of  the 
Greek  philosophy  with  its  Logos  mediation  doc- 
trine. This  new  cycle  continued  under  the  law  of 
development  to  the  Nicene-Athanasian  period,  and 
in  the  Greek  Church  down  through  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  even  to  the  present  day.  But  in  the 
West  a  new  cycle  began  with  Augustine.  Augus- 
tinian  christology  was  not  radically  revolutionary. 
It  continued  the  old  Greek  trinitarian  evolution, 
but  it  changed  its  point  of  departure,  and  inverted 
its  whole  meaning.  A  new  force  entered  chris- 
tology, viz.,  the  New  Platonic  monism.  The  history 
of  Christian  dogma  is  as  full  as  the  earth's  geolo- 
gical surface  of  such   cyclic   changes.     The   last 


THE  NEW  HISTORICAL  EVOLUTION      177 

one  in  trinitarian  evolution  is  that  connected  with 
the  theory  of  man's  consubstantiality  with  God, 
which  reminds  us  of  the  Augustinian  inversion  of 
Greek  christology,  being  similarly  a  change  of 
base  rather  than  the  discarding  of  older  views,  and 
equally  the  result  of  a  changed  philosophy.  But 
both  in  nature  and  in  history  crises  have  occurred, 
usually  after  long  intervals  of  quiet  development, 
when  the  old  line  of  evolution  is  not  merely  de- 
flected or  changed  by  cyclic  law,  but  completely 
broken  by  natural  or  historical  convulsions  and 
revolutions.  A  new  force  of  tremendous  power 
has  come  into  play,  breaking  up  utterly  all  previous 
orderly  movement,  and  compelling  a  completely 
new  evolutionary  beginning.  Such  were  the 
mighty  catastrophes  of  the  geologic  world  whose 
traces  are  seen  in  the  vast  upheavals  and  depres- 
sions of  mountain  and  vaUey,  and  in  the  rents  that 
have  formed  such  ravines  as  the  canons  of  Colo- 
rado. Just  such  cataclysms  have  occurred  in  the 
history,  not  only  of  political  governments,  but  of 
religious  and  theological  dogmas.  It  is  only  need- 
ful to  mention  the  religious  revolution  wrought  by 
the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus  and  the  preaching 
of  his  great  apostle  Paul,  and  also  the  Protestant 
Reformation  in  the  time  of  Luther  and  his  com- 
peers. In  both  these  cases  a  complete  rent  was 
made  in  the  old  order  of  faith  and  thought.  Chris- 
tianity, after  centuries  of  conflict,  gave  its  death- 
blow to  ancient  paganism  as  a  religious  system  in 
the  Eoman  empire,  though  its  hidden  leaven  still 


178        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

continued  to  live  and  work.  The  same  was  true 
of  the  Lutheran  movement.  First,  violent  reac- 
tion led  to  radical  revolt,  and  then  out  of  revolu- 
tion came  a  new  Protestant  system  of  faith,  founded 
in  part  indeed  on  the  old  Catholic  traditions,  but 
also  leavened  by  the  new  inductive  science  with  its 
cardinal  principle  of  individual  freedom.  The 
Lutheran  age  thus  heralded  the  dawn  of  our 
modern  world.  But  such  radical  revolutionary 
movements  are  always  the  result  of  deep  underly- 
ing causes,  involving  a  long  historical  preparation. 
Christianity  did  not  drop  into  history  out  of  the 
clouds  of  heaven.  It  was  prefaced  by  a  religious 
reaction  that  became  widespread  throughout  the 
Grseco-Koman  world.  The  old  polytheistic  and 
mythological  paganism  had  lost  utterly  its  hold  on 
the  educated  classes.  Men  had  not  grown  irre- 
ligious, —  history  proves  the  contrary,  —  but  a 
profound  skepticism  had  arisen  concerning  the 
traditional  faiths.  A  new  ground  of  religious  be- 
lief was  sought  in  philosophy,  but  here  too  all  was 
confusion  and  doubt,  so  that  even  Cicero,  after 
pleading  like  a  Christian  for  the  immortality  of 
the  soul,  was  forced  to  say  that  he  doubted  of 
all.  It  was  into  such  a  religious  vacuum  that 
Christianity  with  its  "  enthusiasm  "  of  faith  and 
"  humanity  "  came  as  a  new  power  of  spiritual  life. 
A  similar  series  of  causes  brought  on  the  Protest- 
ant revolt.  Roman  Catholicism  had  run  its  race 
of  a  thousand  years,  until  its  cup  of  supersti- 
tions and  tyrannies  over  the  souls  and  bodies  of 


THE  NEW  HISTORICAL  EVOLUTION      179 

men  was  full.  The  cycle  of  faith  on  authority 
had  run  out,  and  skepticism  imder  every  sort  of 
cover  and  concealment  was  honeycombing  modern 
Christendom.  Philosophical  skepticism,  that  is, 
the  doctrine  that  a  dogma  of  faith  might  be  true 
in  theology  and  yet  be  false  in  philosophy,  was  in 
vogue  everywhere  and  showed  that  the  end  of 
Catholic  church  authority  was  at  hand.  Scholastic 
theology  had  dug  its  own  grave.  When  Luther 
appeared,  according  to  the  explicit  testimony  of 
Erasmus,  a  man  who  knew  the  temper  of  his  age, 
everything  was  ready  for  a  complete  overturning 
of  religious  faith.  The  hour  had  struck  and  the 
man  for  the  hour  had  come. 

And  now  how  about  the  situation  to-day  ?  The 
logic  of  history  gives  us  but  one  solution.  As  we 
have  seen,  we  are  at  the  end  of  the  old  lines  of 
development.  Even  the  old  bottles  with  the  false 
labels  have  become  useless.  The  eyes  of  men  are 
opened,  and  no  new  cycle  along  some  new  line  of 
philosophical  thought  is  possible.  Metaphysics 
has  tried  its  hand  and  miserably  failed.  Some 
even  who  have  been  active  in  destroying  what  "  is 
ready  to  vanish  away  "  are  growing  faint-hearted. 
There  are  always  those  who  are  ready  to  be  caught 
by  the  wiles  of  philosophy,  but  history  has  of  late 
been  busy  with  its  critical  tasks,  and  its  revela- 
tions of  what  philosophy  has  attempted  and  failed 
to  do  have  made  even  the  credulous  wary.  Mean- 
while skepticism  is  silently  doing  its  work.  This 
is  not  ^'  an  age  of  doubt "  in  the  true  religious 


180        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

meaning  of  that  word.  It  is  not  an  irreligious  age, 
nor  a  scoffing  age.  It  is  a  serious,  earnest,  believ- 
ing age  in  its  whole  spirit.  It  seeks  religious  light, 
and  it  glows  with  the  fire  of  religious  love  and 
freedom.  But  as  to  the  old  dogmatic  traditional- 
ism, that  has  come  down  from  early  Christian  days 
with  aU  its  gathered  inheritance  of  pagan,  monk- 
ish, mediaeval,  and  popish  superstitions  and  be- 
liefs, this  age  is  intensely  skeptical.  Among  the 
masses  of  the  people  it  has  been  thrown  aside  as  a 
cast-off  garment.  The  skeptical  spirit,  in  the  sense 
of  refusal  to  accept  the  dogmas  of  the  old  ortho- 
doxy, was  no  more  widespread  or  complete  in  the 
first  years  of  the  Christian  era,  or  at  the  outbreak 
of  the  Lutheran  reformation,  than  it  is  to-day. 
Ask  men  and  women  why  they  have  ceased  to  at- 
tend church,  and  they  will  tell  you  that  they  have 
ceased  to  believe  much  that  is  preached,  and  that 
their  religious  needs  are  not  ministered  to.  I 
wonder  whether  those  who  assume  to  sit  in  Moses' 
seat  realize  with  any  degree  of  adequacy  the  large- 
ness and  power  of  this  skeptical  revolt.  It  makes 
no  noise  in  the  streets,  but  it  permeates  the  very 
atmosphere  of  social  and  religious  life,  like  an  un- 
seen odor  of  flowers.  All  this  simply  means  that 
we  are  nearing  the  end  of  the  present  theological 
era,  and  are  on  the  verge  of  radical  change.  This 
is  dimly  seen  by  not  a  few.  Men  who  stand  on 
the  watch-towers  of  our  Zion  have  taken  note  of 
coming  events.  We  hear  much  now  of  "  recon- 
struction."     We  are   having   "  new   theologies " 


THE  NEW  HISTORICAL  EVOLUTION      181 

and  "  new  Puritanisms  ; "  but  men  still  fail  to 
realize  that  the  time  for  superficial  cyclic  changes 
is  past,  and  that  aU  "  the  signs  of  the  times  " 
point  to  the  vastest  moral,  religious,  theological 
revolution  that  has  yet  transpired  in  history.  It 
is  not  an  old  building  rebuttressed  and  recon- 
structed in  its  upper  stories  that  this  age  demands, 
but  a  new  building  from  the  very  foimdations. 
Yet  men  are  calling  for  some  theological  architect 
and  artificer,  to  lead  in  reconstruction,  as  if  the 
time  had  come  for  any  such  action.  Why  has  no 
signal  theological  leader  appeared  in  these  latter 
days  ?  The  reason  is  simple.  There  can  be  no 
leadership  without  a  lead.  To-day  there  is  no 
clear  lead.  Theological  leadership,  like  eloquence, 
requires  not  only  the  man,  but  also,  and  first  of 
aU,  the  subject  and  the  occasion.  The  man  does 
not  yet  appear,  because  the  work  is  not  yet  cut 
out  for  him.  The  times  are  not  yet  ripe.  Times 
of  reaction  and  revolution  are  first  of  all  destruc- 
tive. The  old  house  must  be  torn  down  before 
the  new  house  can  be  built.  Men  are  beginning 
to  see  some  of  the  steps  of  this  destructive  process 
and  are  attempting  to  call  a  halt.  "  The  work  of 
destruction  has  gone  far  enough,"  says  President 
Hyde  in  the  "  Congregationalist,"  and  that  journal 
takes  up  and  repeats  the  cry,  at  the  same  time, 
however,  making  some  unusual  concessions,  and 
allowing  that  "our  churches,  in  common  with 
other  Christian  denominations,  have  for  a  quarter 
of  a  century  been  experiencing  a  disintegration  of 


182        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

doctrine,"  and  urging  that  the  time  has  come  for 
"  clear,  strong  discussions  and  affirmations  of  great 
doctrines  in  the  language  which  men  use  to-day  and 
in  the  light  of  the  discoveries  they  have  made  and 
the  knowledge  they  have  acquired."  All  of  which 
sounds  well ;  but  one  cannot  help  asking  whether 
the  "  great  doctrines "  referred  to  are  not  the 
dogmas  of  the  old  creeds,  and  whether  "  the  lan- 
guage which  men  use  to-day"  means  anything 
more  than  a  new  label  for  the  old  bottles,  in  which 
case  I  submit,  as  a  historical  observer,  that  such 
"  discussions  and  affirmations "  will  be  utterly 
vain. 

But  it  is  time  to  interrogate  our  age  more  di- 
rectly. We  have  hitherto  studied  the  course  of 
historical  evolution  and  seen  what  must  be  its  logi- 
cal outcome,  viz.,  an  intellectual  and  religious 
revolution.  Now  let  our  age  speak  for  itself,  and 
help  us  to  answer  the  question,  what  next  ?  To 
describe  at  any  length  the  wonderful  chapter  of 
history  that  the  last  fifty  years  have  added  to  human 
annals  is  impossible  in  our  present  survey.  Most 
people  of  intelligence  have  some  general  impression 
of  it,  and  have  become  accustomed  to  the  idea 
that  we  are  living  in  an  entirely  different  world 
from  that  of  our  fathers.  But  it  is  only  the  his- 
torical student  who  has  clearly  grasped  the  law  of 
historical  evolution,  and  has  followed  its  course 
from  the  earliest  historical  records  down  to  the 
present  era,  that  can  fully  comprehend  its  extraor- 
dinary character.      It  has  often   been   said  that 


THE  NEW  HISTORICAL  EVOLUTION      183 

the  history  of  an  age  cannot  be  intelligently  written 
until  a  generation  or  more  has  elapsed,  so  that  the 
true  perspective  may  be  obtained.  No  doubt  there 
is  much  of  truth  in  this.  There  is  danger  of  over 
estimation,  by  reason  of  closeness  of  vision,  and 
also  equally  of  under  estimation  for  the  very  same 
reason.  But  it  surely  is  a  wrong  inference  that, 
when  great  and  striking  events  occur  in  the  politi- 
cal, intellectual,  or  religious  world,  they  cannot  be 
seen  or  estimated  at  their  real  value  by  the  men 
who  witness  them.  First-hand  witnesses  are  after 
all  the  best  and  most  reliable  in  the  court  of  his- 
torical appeal.  And  whatever  may  be  said  of 
other  times,  certainly  the  age  in  which  we  live  is 
one  that  he  who  runs  may  read.  Never  was  such 
a  deep  and  radical  break  and  cleavage  made  be- 
tween successive  evolutionary  movements  and  re- 
sults in  the  history  of  man,  as  this  age  of  ours  is 
witnessing.  Even  to  enumerate  fully  the  marvel- 
ous discoveries  in  science,  in  history,  in  language, 
in  archaeology  and  geography,  would  be  impossible. 
Take  for  example  the  two  sciences  of  astronomy 
and  electricity,  and  note  what  a  boundless  uni- 
verse previously  unimagined,  and  what  tremendous 
forces  previously  hid  in  nature,  have  been  revealed. 
Human  invention  has  added  its  quota  to  human 
discovery  and  research  until  man  and  nature  have 
seemed  almost  to  be  rivals  for  the  tribute  of  our 
admiration  and  astonishment.  These  achievements 
of  the  human  mind  in  scientific  and  historical  fields 
have  stirred  the  intellectual  blood  of  the  age,  so 


184        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tliat  Kterature  and  philosophy  have  felt  the  im- 
pulse and  added  a  new  chapter  to  the  history  of 
human  thought  and  feeling,  of  wonderful  power 
and  beauty.  Never  has  the  intellect  of  man  had 
such  wide  scope  of  vision  and  such  immeasurable 
fields  of  research  opened  to  its  activities  as  now. 
And  such  epochs  of  intellectual  stimulus  are  always 
accompanied  with  new  movements  and  agitations 
in  the  domains  of  ethics  and  religion.  It  was  the 
golden  age  of  Graeco-Roman  civilization  that  intro- 
duced a  new  religion  to  the  world,  which  has  sur- 
passed aU  others  in  its  ethical  and  reHgious  purity 
and  loftiness  and  universaHty  of  range.  It  was 
the  revival  of  learning  with  its  crowning  renais- 
sance of  the  fifteenth  century  that  paved  the  way 
for  Erasmus,  Luther,  and  Calvin,  and  the  religious 
reformation  of  which  they  were  such  distinguished 
representatives.  It  is  always  so.  This  age  of 
ours  is  alive  beyond  all  previous  times  to  the  ap- 
peals, the  "  categorical  imperatives  "  of  man's  re- 
ligious nature.  Thus  on  all  sides  we  find  ourselves 
in  the  face  of  an  epoch  of  unparalleled  significance, 
and  the  impression  made  by  it  upon  the  critical 
observer,  as  he  scans  the  evolution  of  history  thus 
far  from  start  to  finish,  is  indeed  profound.  Our 
age  surely  needs  no  herald  to  trumpet  its  deeds. 
They  are  engraved  on  every  re-written  and  re- 
edited,  as  well  as  newly  added  page  of  human 
annals  in  every  field  of  man's  activity. 

And  now  what  answer  does  it  give  to  our  ques- 
tion. What  next  ?    Is  not  the  logical  answer  drawn 


THE  NEW  HISTORICAL  EVOLUTION      185 

from  the  law  of  evolution  that  rules  in  history  also 
the  answer  of  the  present  historical  situation? 
Can  such  an  epoch  pass  by  and  leave  no  deep  trace 
of  itself  in  philosophy,  in  theology,  in  ethics  and 
religion  ?  Surely  not.  The  revolution  that  im- 
pends must  be  as  radical  and  far-reaching  as  the 
movements  and  changes  that  will  bring  it  to  pass. 
What  then  will  be  its  character  and  lines  of  direc- 
tion ?  The  new  revolution  will  certainly  be  along 
the  lines  of  the  deepest  and  most  vital  demands  of 
the  times.  These  demands  may  be  gathered  under 
three  heads :  1,  the  demand  of  the  historical  spirit ; 
2,  the  demand  of  the  religious  spirit ;  3,  the  demand 
of  the  intellectual  spirit. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  DEMAND   OF  THE   HISTORICAL    SPIRIT 

It  will  be  seen  as  we  proceed  that  these  three 
demands  are  organically  related  and  that  the  order 
above  given  is  the  logical  one,  and  consequently 
the  one  that  the  historical  evolution  will  naturally 
take.  Every  epoch  has  its  own  peculiar  Zeit- 
geist^ or  time  spirit.  Some  periods  are  creative 
and  constructive,  others  are  traditional  and  con- 
servative, others  still  are  reactionary,  critical,  revo- 
lutionary. The  different  ages  of  the  world  have 
their  varied  types  and  characteristics  by  which 
they  are  known  to  historians.  That  which  char- 
acterizes our  own  age  above  everything  else  is 
historical  criticism.  The  historical  is  the  time 
spirit  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  every  other 
spirit  must  yield  obedience  to  it.  It  had  its  birth 
in  the  scientific  inductive  method.  When  that 
method  of  research  was  applied  to  historical  events 
as  well  as  scientific  investigation,  a  revolution  was 
at  once  precipitated  in  the  whole  range  of  histor- 
ical studies.  History  itself  had  to  be  re-written. 
Myth,  legend,  miracle,  all  the  marvels  of  a  super- 
natural realm  of  beings  supposed  to  hold  close  re- 
lations with  mankind  were  step  by  step  eliminated 


DEMAND  OF   THE  HISTORICAL  SPIRIT    187 

from  the  annals  of  human  events.  Mythology  and 
the  miraculous  may  have  place  in  a  cosmogony  or 
a  philosophy  of  God  and  the  universe,  but  they 
are  not  integral  elements  of  human  action,  or  of 
history,  which  is  simply  a  record  of  such  action. 
The  literary  revolution  caused  by  this  critical 
movement  is  already  a  matter  of  history.  But  it 
is  the  work  of  a  single  century.  Distinguished 
among  its  pioneers  are  Gibbon  and  Niebuhr. 
Niebuhr's  critical  reconstruction  of  Livy's  "  Eo- 
man  History "  by  which  the  miraculous  legends 
that  had  grown  up  around  the  origins  of  Rome 
were  separated  from  the  authentic  narrative,  made 
an  epoch  in  historical  studies.  Romulus  and  Re- 
mus and  Numa  at  once  ceased  to  be  historical  char- 
acters, and  were  transferred  to  their  proper  place 
in  the  calendar  of  mythical  founders  of  cities  and 
states.  Slowly  out  of  the  legendary  and  semi-his- 
torical traditions  of  a  barbarous  age  the  materials 
of  real  history  began  to  be  gathered,  and  the  foun- 
dations were  thus  laid  of  a  new  historical  science. 
It  is  not  strange  that  the  critical  spirit  soon 
began  to  deal  with  the  Bible  itself.  That  wonder- 
ful collection  of  Hebrew-Jewish  literature  had  been 
converted  into  a  single  sacred  volume,  and  all  its 
mythology,  legend,  poetry,  prophecy,  and  apoca- 
lypse, as  well  as  so-called  historical  books,  had 
been  treated  as  one  historical  record  from  begin- 
ning to  end.  The  conversations  related  in  Genesis 
as  occurring  between  God,  Adam,  Eve,  and  the 
serpent,  were   held   to   be   as  veracious   as  that 


188        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

between  David  and  Nathan,  or  between  Christ  and 
the  woman  of  Samaria.  The  results  of  the  higher 
criticism  in  its  investigation  of  the  Old  Testament 
cannot  here  be  told.  Enough  to  say  that  its  main 
conclusions  are  clearly  established,  and  many  a 
scriptural  story  to  which  we  listened  in  our  child- 
hood with  a  faith  that  knew  no  doubting  has  lost 
forever  its  historical  credibility,  if  not  its  religious 
moral.  To  pass  from  the  Old  Testament  to  the 
New  was  a  logical  necessity.  But  the  forces  of 
dogmatic  conservatism  have  here  striven  to  bar 
the  way,  and  a  conflict  is  being  waged  which  can 
have  but  one  issue.  For  the  same  evolutionary 
processes  have  worked  in  the  development  of  all 
historical  literature.  True  history  has  ever  and 
everywhere  been  a  slow  growth  out  of  myth  and 
legend  and  prehistoric  tradition.  Biblical  history 
is  no  exception.  Nor  can  any  line  be  drawn 
between  the  Old  Testament  and  the  New.  Legend 
just  as  plainly  plays  its  part  in  Matthew,  Luke, 
and  Acts  as  in  Genesis  and  Kings,  though  not 
perhaps  as  fully.  It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that 
legend  is  confined  to  prehistoric  periods.  It  is 
ever  active,  a  sort  of  parasitic  growth  on  every 
historical  tree.  The  life  of  Washington  has  its 
legends.  Mr.  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  in  his  excel- 
lent biography,  has  made  us  acquainted  with  the 
curious  manner  in  which  the  cherry-tree  and 
hatchet  story  was  evolved  out  of  the  fertile  brain 
of  Weems,  an  earlier  biographer.  Pity  that  such 
a  good   moral   should   be  spoiled  by  the  critical 


DEMAND  OF  THE  HISTORICAL  SPIRIT    189 

historian.  But  is  not  the  moral  just  as  good  even 
if  the  story  behind  it  is  legendary  ?  Do  the  les- 
sons of  Christ's  parables  lose  any  of  their  moral 
power  because  these  parables  are  not  historically 
true  ?  I  am  sure  the  tale  of  George  Washington's 
boyish  truthfulness  will  stiU  be  repeated  to  admir- 
ing children  for  many  a  day.  And  if  the  life  of 
Washington,  passed  under  the  noonday  light  of 
this  modem  world,  has  legendary  elements,  why 
should  not  such  legendary  tales  find  their  way  into 
the  life  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  even  more  easily,  in 
those  uncritical  times  ? 

But  the  work  of  historical  criticism  could  not  stop 
here.  The  ancient  literature  as  it  was  handed  down 
accumulated  on  its  way  a  mass  of  interpolations 
and  additions,  and  of  entire  writings  whose  author- 
ship was  falsely  ascribed  to  men  of  renown  in 
earlier  periods.  The  object  of  this  deception,  as 
it  would  be  regarded  to-day,  was  to  increase  the 
authority  of  such  writings  by  the  veneration  for  a 
great  name.  The  fine  moral  sense  which  is  felt 
by  us  in  regard  to  such  deception  was  evidently 
foreign  to  the  ancient  world.  The  number  of 
these  writings  of  falsely  assumed  authorship  was 
legion.  Thus  the  critical  examination  of  texts 
and  dates  and  authors  became  an  important  part 
of  critical  work.  The  Bible,  it  was  found,  was 
especially  full  of  such  textual  corruptions  and  of 
titles  of  authors  that  were  entirely  wanting  in 
critical  authority.  The  traditional  dates  and 
authors  of  by  far  the  largest  part  of  the  Biblical 


190        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

writings  are  of  no  historical  value.  The  Jews  in 
fact  seem  to  have  been  sinners  above  others  in  this 
kind  of  "  royal  lie."  The  number  of  Jewish  writ- 
ings in  the  centuries  immediately  preceding  and 
following  Christ's  birth,  whose  true  authorship  was 
thus  hidden  under  the  cover  of  some  great  name, 
is  amazing.  Enoch,  Moses,  Solomon,  Pythagoras, 
Plato,  Aristotle,  are  but  specimen  names  among 
the  many  that  were  employed.  Is  it  any  wonder, 
then,  that  the  Bible  is  found  open  to  the  same 
kind  of  criticism  ?  It  is  difficult  to  realize,  or  even 
conceive,  how  utterly  wanting  in  the  critical  spirit 
the  early  Christian  centuries  were.  The  old  the- 
ory of  inspiration  by  which  such  literary  sins  of 
ignorance  were  not  merely  condoned  but  even 
denied  can  no  longer  be  held.  Its  very  founda- 
tions have  been  destroyed  by  the  dissolving  force 
of  the  new  criticism.  Who  wiU  claim  to-day  for 
the  writers  of  the  books  of  the  Bible  a  gift  of 
critical  insight  which  is  wholly  the  result  of  the 
modem  scientific  inductive  method  ?  To  hide  the 
whole  question  of  authorship,  dates,  and  corrupt 
texts  behind  such  a  preposterous  claim  is  surely 
vain.  To  assume,  for  example,  such  an  inspiration 
for  the  author  of  the  Epistle  of  Jude  as  to  make  it 
possible  to  believe  that  the  quotation  there  given 
from  a  writing  of  Enoch,  who  was  supposed  to 
have  lived  before  the  flood,  is  reaUy  genuine,  is 
surely  beyond  the  credulity  of  the  average  man  j 
for  it  involves  the  astonishing  corollary  that  such 
a  ''Book  of  Enoch"  as  was  extant   in    the  first 


DEMAND  OF  THE  HISTORICAL  SPIBIT    191 

century  of  the  Christian  era  had  actually  survived 
the  deluge  itseK.  Such  are  the  shifts  to  which  the 
old  doctrine  of  scripture  was  driven.  Similar  is 
the  effort  to  prove  the  historicity  of  the  Jonah 
story  from  Christ's  quoting  it,  assuming  in  him  a 
critical  insight  of  which  his  life  gives  no  evidence, 
and  making  that  the  ground  for  the  historicity  of 
a  narrative  which  bears  on  its  very  face  the  clear 
signs  of  being  merely  a  parabolic  sermon. 

The  work  of  historical  criticism  in  connection 
with  the  Bible  is  not  yet  complete.  This  is  espe- 
cially true  of  the  New  Testament.  Here  the  battle 
of  the  critics  is  still  being  waged.  The  storm 
centre  of  late  has  been  the  question  of  the  Johan- 
nine  authorship  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  It  is  no 
wonder  that  this  position  is  so  obstinately  con- 
tested by  the  defenders  of  the  old  theology,  for 
with  it  goes  the  last  refuge  of  traditional  trinita- 
rian  dogma.  This  is  fully  recognized  on  all  sides. 
Mr.  K.  H.  Hutton  in  his  recent  "  Spectator "  es- 
says allows  that  "  if  the  fourth  Gospel  could  be 
relegated  to  the  middle  of  the  second  century,  it 
would  have  no  authority  at  all,  as  expounding  the 
theology  of  the  incarnation.''  He  also  quotes  Dr. 
Liddon  as  affirming  that  such  a  critical  result 
would  "go  to  the  root  of  the  Christian  revelation, 
at  all  events  as  it  has  been  understood  by  nine 
tenths  of  all  existing  Christians."  ^  That  such 
men  have  grounds  for  their  judgment  is  seen  in 
the  fact  that  the  whole  Nicene  Trinitarianism  was 
1  Aspects  of  Religious  and  Scientific  TliougU,  p.  225. 


192        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

made  to  rest  by  Athanasias  on  proof -texts  from 
the  fourth  Gospel.  But  this  suggests  to  us  that 
still  another  duty  lay  before  the  Christian  histor- 
ical critic.  On  these  uncritical  and  unhistorical 
assumptions  as  to  the  character  of  the  Bible  there 
had  been  built  in  the  course  of  centuries  a  system 
of  Christian  dogmas  which  became  the  religious 
faith  of  Christendom.  That  system  of  doctrine 
was  compelled  in  its  turn  to  submit  to  critical 
examination.  The  law  of  historical  evolution  has 
become  the  master  key  to  unlock  and  reveal  the 
secret  of  its  origin.  Our  previous  survey  contains 
the  history  of  the  manner  in  which  that  key  has 
been  used,  and  of  the  results  that  have  been 
reached.  "  Christian  origins  "  have  been  the  field 
of  the  most  intense  interest  and  of  the  most  mar- 
velous historical  discoveries  during  the  last  few 
years.  But  "  Christian  origins  "  are  only  a  step- 
ping stone  to  the  "  origins  "  of  other  ethnic  reli- 
gions. Here  a  new  field  of  research  and  criticism 
was  opened,  which  has  thrown  a  flood  of  light  on 
the  study  of  Christian  "  origins,"  and  given  a  new 
aspect  to  the  whole  subject  of  the  origin  of  reli- 
gion itself. 

Our  object  in  thus  summarily  sketching  the 
critical  movement  is  to  bring  out  the  fact  that  it 
cannot  stop  until  its  work  is  really  finished.  It 
is  this  work  that  gives  our  age  its  true  signifi- 
cance. The  "Time  Spirit"  must  "finish  the  work 
that  is  given  it  to  do,"  and  until  that  work  is  done, 
no  other  work  of  any  real  and  lasting  worth  can 


DEMAND  OF  THE  HISTORICAL  SPIRIT    193 

be  made,  by  any  effort  of  man,  to  take  its  place. 
And  that  work  needs  no  apology.  It  is  amazing 
how  misunderstood,  in  some  quarters,  the  mission 
of  historical  criticism  is.  It  is  charged  with  being 
a  negative  and  destructive  spirit,  as  if  this  were  a 
mark  of  reproach.  It  is  even  more  amazing  to 
find  historical  critics  themselves  defending  and  ex- 
cusing their  work  as  if  the  reproach  was  merited. 
The  true  answer  to  all  such  accusations  is  that 
the  first  work  of  the  historical  critic  must  be  de- 
structive in  the  very  nature  of  things,  and  that, 
imtil  that  work  has  been  thoroughly  done,  no 
other  work  is  in  order.  The  cry  now  being  heard 
that  it  is  time  for  the  destructive  process  to  cease 
is  simply  an  anachronism.  It  implies  that  the 
work  of  destruction  is  complete,  when  in  fact  it 
is  but  half  done.  How  can  new  foundations  be- 
gin to  be  laid  while  men  are  still  contesting  inch 
by  inch  the  removal  of  stones  and  timbers  from 
the  old  mediaeval  edifice  that  have  nothing  but 
unhistorical  tradition  and  superstition  on  which  to 
rest  ?  Is  it  the  part  of  wisdom  to  attempt  to 
rebuild  in  such  circumstances  ?  It  is  not  only  un- 
wise, it  is  impossible.  All  such  reconstruction  is 
simply  wasted  labor,  a  temporary  patchwork  soon 
to  be  cast  aside.  Much  work  of  this  sort  is  being 
done.  I  fuUy  realize  how  important  it  is,  at  a 
time  like  this,  "  to  strengthen  the  things  that  re- 
main," and  I  as  fully  appreciate  all  such  efforts. 
But  the  fact  nevertheless  holds  true,  that  if  ever 
there  was  a  period  of  theological  literature  evan- 


194        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM  ! 

escent   as   the  passing  breeze,  it  is   that  which  i 

marks  this  present  time,  when  the  critical  spirit  f 

is  still  earnestly  employed  in  its  divinely  commis-  \ 

sioned  destructive  labors.     But  let  it  not  be  for-  i 

gotten  that  the  TQ2I  final  aim  of  historical  criticism  ' 
is  not  destructive  but  constructive.    When  the  old 

false  dogmas  shall  have  been  radically  removed  | 
and  the  true  historical  rock-bed  shall  have  been 

found,  the  same  spirit  of  history  that  has  worked  "\ 

destructively  will  change  its  whole  manner  of  op-  \ 

eration,  and  the  same  law  of  scientific  evolution  j 

that  has  been  engaged  in  throwing  off  the  worn-  \ 

out  garments  of  its  childhood  will  be  found  as  j 
earnestly  at  work  to  weave  the  new  garments  of 
its  manhood,  yea,  the  true  wedding  garments  of  the 

new  Christianity.  ] 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE   DEMAND   OF   THE   RELIGIOUS   SPIRIT 

We  are  now  prepared  to  consider  the  second 
demand  of  our  age,  —  the  demand  of  faith^  in 
other  words,  of  man's  religious  nature.  This  age 
has  often  been  described  as  one  of  religious  doubt 
and  skepticism,  as  if  it  were  immersed  in  worldli- 
ness  and  wholly  averse  to  matters  of  religion.  But 
nothing  could  be  further  from  the  truth.  The  his- 
torical and  critical  spirit  that  rules  the  age  has 
indeed  opened  the  eyes  of  men  to  the  real  charac- 
ter of  many  of  the  old  traditional  dogmas,  and 
they  have  cast  them  aside.  Such  skepticism  is 
necessary  and  healthful.  It  is  an  essential  ele- 
ment in  aU  true  critical  study.  Lord  Acton  has 
weU  said  that  the  first  attitude  of  the  historical 
critic  towards  all  supposed  facts  is  '^  suspidon,^^ 
Diderot  declared  that  "  doubt "  was  the  beginning 
of  philosophy.  These  expressions  simply  set  forth 
the  fundamental  principle  of  the  scientific  induc- 
tive method,  viz.,  that  everything  claiming  to  be 
true  must  be  critically  examined  and  questioned 
before  it  is  accepted.  It  was  the  application  of 
this  principle  that  gave  us  the  new  science  and  the 
new  history ;  and  its  further  application  to-day  is 


196        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

giving  us  a  new  Christian  faith.  Viewed  in  its 
true  historical  aspect,  what  is  called  the  doubting 
spirit  of  this  age  is  its  highest  title  to  moral  emi- 
nence. Skepticism  is  very  different  from  irre- 
ligiousness,  and  yet  is  too  often  confounded  with 
it.  This  age  is  in  many  ways  intensely  skeptical, 
but  at  the  same  time  is  as  intensely  religious.  No 
age  since  Christ  was  ever  more  ready  to  listen  to 
a  gospel  that  comes  with  moral  authority  to  the 
soul.  But  every  gospel  must  show  its  credentials ; 
and  until  these  credentials  are  subjected  to  scru- 
tiny and  are  found  valid  in  the  highest  court  of 
moral  appeal  faith  holds  itself  in  reserve.  In 
these  days  of  theological  jarring  and  unrest,  when 
the  old  supposed  foundations  of  faith  are  being 
shaken  to  their  centre,  such  reserve  of  religious 
belief  and  trust  is  becoming  a  common  charac- 
teristic of  thoughtful  and  self-balanced  men  and 
women,  and  is  really  a  noble  quality,  showing  a 
nature  that  respects  its  own  moral  freedom.  Mr. 
E..  H.  Hutton  has  remarked  in  one  of  his  "  Spec- 
tator "  essays  :  "  I  am  not  ashamed  to  feel  far  more 
sympathy  with  the  nobler  aspects  of  unbelief  than 
with  the  ignobler  and  shiftier  aspects  of  so-caUed 
faith ;  "  —  a  statement  that  reveals  in  Mr.  Hutton 
himself  a  rare  insight  into  the  religious  character 
of  our  age,  and  also  the  instinct  of  a  noble  and 
enlarged  Christian  temper  of  mind.  The  spirit 
of  faith  in  any  age  may  be  strong  and  active, 
and  yet  the  objects  of  faith  may  be  vague  and 
uncertain.      Such  is  the  case  among  us  to-day. 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT    197 

Men  everywhere  are  open-eyed  to  religious  things. 
With  the  wonderful  renaissance  of  the  human 
inteUect  brought  about  by  the  stimulus  of  scien- 
tific and  historical  researches,  a  similar  renaissance 
and  awakening  of  moral  consciousness  has  fol- 
lowed which  demands  a  new  revelation  of  religious 
truth. 

And  here  we  are  at  a  point  where  we  can  see 
how  essential  it  was  that  historical  criticism  should 
first  complete  its  mission,  —  a  mission  that  was  to 
work  toward  enlightenment  and  freedom,  having 
Christ's  assurance  for  its  watchword :  "  If  the 
truth  shall  make  you  free,  ye  shall  he  free  in- 
deed^  For  the  faith  of  men  had  been  bound 
hand  and  foot.  A  usurped  authority  had  shackled 
human  consciences  with  creeds  and  dogmas  and 
"commandments  of  men."  Ignorance  is  always 
the  mother  of  superstition.  That  ignorance  had 
to  be  dispelled  before  faith  could  release  itself 
from  its  fetters  and  regain  its  lost  freedom.  Such 
has  been  the  truly  divine  mission  of  the  new  his- 
tory. Not  only  the  intellects  but  also  the  con- 
sciences of  men  have  been  thereby  awakened  to  a 
new  intelligence  and  freedom.  And  it  is  on  these 
twin  pillars  that  the  new  faith  of  men  will  be 
built.  Such  a  faith  wiU  never  go  back  to  the  old 
discarded  dogmas  of  the  ages  of  ignorance  and 
superstition.  It  will  build  itself  from  foundation 
stone  on  the  new-found  truth  of  the  historic  Chiist 
and  Christian  gospel.  Here  history  again  becomes 
its  helper.    Faith  will  stiU  have  its  "  ventures,"  as 


198        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Bushnell  has  suggestively  called  them,  and  freely 
spread  its  wings  to  the  upper  air  where  the  mys- 
tical spirit  so  loves  to  dwell,  but  its  feet  will  yet 
be  fixed  on  solid  historical  ground.  Myth,  legend, 
and  speculative  philosophy  will  be  taken  at  their 
real  value.  Who  Christ  actually  was,  what  his 
teachings  were,  in  fact,  what  the  spirit  and  char- 
acter of  his  life  and  death  were,  in  the  light  of 
veritable  history,  not  in  the  romantic  traditions  of 
a  later  age,  —  the  answers  to  these  questions  will 
be  the  firm  basis  on  which  Christian  faith  will 
securely  rest,  yes,  "  the  faith  once  delivered  "  in- 
deed, not  as  misread  and  misinterpreted  by  after 
times,  but  as  originally  experienced  in  Christ's 
own  disciples ;  as,  for  example,  in  "  the  woman 
that  was  a  sinner,"  whose  faith  found  voice  not 
in  creed  indeed,  but  in  loving  kisses  and  penitent 
tears,  and  was  accepted  by  the  Master  as  true  and 
worthy,  when  he  said  to  her,  "  Thy  faith  hath 
saved  thee,  go  in  peace." 

Christ  will  still  be  the  historical  foundation  of 
the  new  Christianity,  "  Christ,  the  same  yesterday, 
to-day,  and  forever,"  not  the  old  Christ  of  Greek 
philosophical  dogma  or  of  mediaeval  superstition, 
nor  the  new  Christ  of  a  legendary  theory  that  re- 
duces him  to  a  mere  historical  shadow,  but  the  real 
Christ  of  true  flesh  and  blood,  "  Jesus  of  Nazareth, 
the  son  of  Joseph  "  and  Mary,  with  a  true  human 
biography  whose  grand  lineaments  are  as  clearly 
defined  as  those  of  Cicero  or  Washington,  and 
shedding  forth  from  that  human  life  an  ineffable 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT    199 

moral  sweetness  and  charm  whicli  draws  men  to 
him  like  a  magnet,  —  yet  withal  true  son  of  God 
because  so  truly  son  of  man,  "  the  image  of  the  in- 
visible God,  the  first  born  of  all  creatures,"  as  Paul 
wrote  of  him,  —  the  very  image  in  which  man  was 
made,  by  which  God  and  man  are  united  in  the 
most  intimate  spiritual  union,  so  that,  in  a  very 
true  and  real  sense,  man  may  be  said  to  be  consub- 
stantial  with  God  and  "partaker  of  the  divine 
nature."  And  it  is  because  of  Christ's  organic 
relationship  with  man  that  he  was  able  to  reach  a 
moral  headship  among  his  fellows,  and  wield  by 
voice  and  speech  and  life  a  moral  authority  that  is 
still  supreme.  For  history  finds  in  Christ  a  moral 
consciousness  that  has  surpassed  that  of  all  other 
men,  in  its  sense  of  God's  true  moral  fatherhood 
and  of  man's  true  moral  sonship,  and  in  its  inti- 
macy of  union  and  communion  with  his  Father  and 
our  Father;  and  so  long  as  men  shall  find  in 
Christ's  own  moral  consciousness  of  God  and  reli- 
gious truth  a  moral  revelation  that  shall  lead  them 
upward  toward  Him,  so  long  wiU  Christ  remain,  as 
no  other  among  the  sons  of  men,  a  divinely  sent 
Messiah ;  and  from  this  Christ  of  history,  become 
the  Christ  of  faith,  the  lines  of  Christian  faith  wiU 
proceed.  The  true  root  of  the  Christian  religious 
consciousness,  of  Christian  faith  in  all  its  forms  of 
religious  experience  and  life,  is  Christ's  own  reli- 
gious consciousness,  in  other  words  Christ's  own 
religion.  That  religion  was  based  upon  two  funda- 
mental principles:  a  faith  in  God  as  the  loving 


200        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Father  of  mankind,  and  a  faith  in  all  men  as  the 
common  children  of  God  and  heirs  of  his  grace  and 
mercy.  Hence  his  proclamation  of  a  divine  for- 
giveness for  all  sinners,  and  his  call  to  them  all  to 
repent  and  accept  the  forgiveness  so  freely  offered. 
This  was  his  gospel  message,  the  great  burden  of 
his  preaching.  Its  essence  is  contained  in  the 
famous  parable  of  the  prodigal  son.  Thus  the  key- 
note of  Christ's  gospel  is  love,  God's  love  kindling 
man's  love,  appealing  to  his  free  moral  agency  as 
a  child  of  God,  and  drawing  him  not  by  force  but 
winningly  and  graciously  back  to  God's  love.  '  So 
that  the  note  of  love  involves  the  note  of  freedom. 
It  is  the  loftiest  attribute  of  man  as  a  moral  being, 
made  in  the  image  of  God,  that  he  has  a  free  will 
which  is  the  ultimate  basis  and  source  of  all  his 
moral  action.  Man  as  a  religious  being  is  a  free 
man,  free  in  his  faith  and  in  his  whole  moral  con- 
sciousness, and  in  the  direction  that  consciousness 
shall  take  in  his  whole  moral  life. 

Along  these  two  central  lines  of  Christ's  religion 
the  new  faith  of  the  age  is  working.  The  early 
Christianity  had  obscured  them  both.  In  their  di- 
visions and  controversies  over  questions  of  dogma 
men  forgot  the  two  essential  keynotes  of  the  gos- 
pel they  were  so  pertinaciously  defending.  They 
ceased  to  love  as  brethren,  and  to  respect  each 
other's  individual  birthright  of  liberty.  The  sad 
consequences  of  bigotry,  hatred,  and  bitterness, 
cruelty  and  outrage,  are  the  staple  of  church  his- 
tory for  a  thousand  years.     Enough  to  say  that 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT    201 

historical  criticism  has  broken  the  yoke  of  man's 
moral  bondage,  and  to-day  he  is  free  in  his  faith 
and  religion.  And  with  freedom  is  fast  returning 
a  new  recognition  of  love  as  the  cardinal  principle 
of  the  gospel  of  Christ  and  of  aU  Christian  faith. 
For  "  He  that  loveth  is  born  of  God  and  knoweth 
God."  And  out  of  love  in  freedom  what  "  fruits 
of  the  spirit "  may  not  grow ! 

Thus  faith  as  we  have  treated  it  is  essentially  a 
free  movement  of  man's  moral  consciousness,  and, 
as  it  develops  itself  in  trust  and  love  and  kindred 
moral  feelings,  is  the  very  heart  of  religion.  The 
religious  life  can  go  no  higher.  Love  to  God  and 
to  man  is  the  whole  moral  law.  Paul  touched  the 
very  centre  of  Christian  experience  when  he  said 
"  Love  never  faileth,  the  greatest  of  all  things  is 
love."  Faith  then  as  such  is  wholly  independent 
of  dogma  and  may  exist  without  dogma.  For 
dogma  is  an  intellectual  credo  and  is  based  on  in- 
tellectual processes.  The  two  may  be  combined, 
but  the  one  does  not  necessarily  include  the  other. 
The  sinning  woman's  grateful  love  and  trust  which 
Christ  called  faith  had  no  dogmatic  background  at 
all,  so  far  as  we  know,  but  was  a  simple  free  moral 
movement  of  her  heart.  It  was  a  terrible  mistake 
that  Christian  theologians  made,  in  changing  the 
meaning  of  faith  from  a  free  exercise  of  the  heart 
and  will  to  a  forced  submission  of  the  intellect  to 
dogmatic  authority.  "  Fides  precedit  intellectum, " 
was  their  motto,  by  which  they  meant  that  an  intel- 
lectual forced  acceptance  of  dogmas,  based  on  the 


202        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

decisions  of  some  ecclesiastical  authority,  should  go 
before  the  use  of  the  individual  reason  in  discover- 
ing the  truth  of  such  dogmas  by  free  investigation. 
Such  a  dictum,  of  course,  when  enforced  by  power, 
enslaved  the  soul,  and  put  every  man's  religious 
convictions  at  the  mercy  of  any  haphazard  spiritual 
tribunal.  '  Still  worse,  it  poisoned  the  very  sources 
of  the  religious  life  by  making  the  essence  of  faith, 
as  the  ground  of  acceptance  with  God  and  of  the 
hope  of  salvation,  consist,  not  in  a  right  state  of 
the  affections  and  will,  that  is,  in  loving  obedience, 
but  in  orthodoxy,  or  the  professed  acceptance  of 
certain  dogmas.  Of  course  such  a  mockery  of 
religion,  such  a  seed  plot  of  hypocrisy,  has  no 
foundation  in  Christ's  teachings  or  in  man's  reli- 
gious nature.  Christ  was  not  a  dogmatist.  He 
gave  no  theological  creed  to  his  disciples.  A  "  pure 
heart,"  not  orthodox  belief,  was  the  test  of  entrance 
into  his  kingdom.  It  is  true  that  he  drew  from 
his  wonderful  religious  consciousness  rich  and  ori- 
ginal lessons  of  faith  and  love  toward  God  and 
man,  but  as  to  a  theological  system,  as  we  caU  it, 
he  never  attempted  to  construct  one  and  failed  to 
indicate  that  he  had  any  sense  of  its  importance. 
His  own  theology,  so  far  as  he  had  any,  was  dis- 
tinctively Jewish.  The  reform  he  instituted  was 
not  along  theological  lines  but  wholly  moral  and 
practical.  His  eschatology  was  that  of  his  day  and 
already  strongly  intrenched  in  the  minds  of  his 
contemporaries.  The  only  new  dogma  that  can  be 
imputed  to  him,  that  of  a  sacrificial  substitutional 


DEMAND   OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT    203 

atonement,  is  surely  a  misunderstanding  of  his  real 
teaching,  a  false  construction  put  on  his  doctrine 
of  love  for  mankind,  which  he  declared  had  its 
highest  illustration  in  the  self-sacrifice  and  sur- 
render that  might  be  carried  to  the  giving  up  of 
life  itself.  Nor  does  the  history  of  man  as  a  reli- 
gious being  give  any  ground  for  such  a  false  defini- 
tion of  faith. "  The  purest  and  sweetest  and  holiest 
souls  that  earth  has  seen  have  often  lived  and  died 
without  any  dogmatic  bias  so  far  as  can  be  known. 
One  can  be  Christlike  without  holding  any  definite 
creed  as  to  Christ's  metaphysical  nature,  or  being 
able  to  answer  the  question  whether  or  not  he  was 
miraculously  born.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that 
the  golden  age  of  theology  in  the  ancient  church — 
the  Nicene  and  post-Nicene  —  was  one  of  marked 
decline  in  the  religious  life  of  the  period,  as  is  viv- 
idly illustrated  in  the  records  of  those  cecumenical 
councils  that  formulated  the  orthodox  creeds.  And 
the  same  was  true  of  the  age  which  produced  the 
Protestant  dogmatic  theology,  —  the  age  of  Calvin 
and  Turretin,  —  a  period  that  has  been  well  de- 
scribed by  Charles  Beard  in  the  "  Hibbert  Lec- 
tures "  of  1883  :  "  I  know  no  epoch  of  Christianity 
to  which  I  could  more  confidently  point,  in  illustra- 
tion of  the  fact,  that  where  there  is  most  theology 
there  is  often  least  religion."  The  spirit  of  dog- 
matism and  bigotry  that  has  vitiated  Christianity 
all  through  its  history  was  born  of  this  confusion 
of  faith  as  a  principle  of  religion  with  intellectual 
belief  as  a  principle  of  dogmatic  theology,  and  if 


204        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

historical  criticism  had  done  nothing  else  than  ex- 
pose its  unhistorical  and  vicious  character,  it  would 
have  amply  vindicated  its  providential  mission. 

Is  it,  then,  of  no  consequence  in  the  religious 
life  what  a  man  believes  ?  Is  dogma  to  be  cast 
out  as  of  no  religious  value  ?  Such  a  result  by  no 
means  follows,  as  will  soon  be  seen.  But  we  are 
now  dealing  with  the  demand  of  the  age  for  the 
satisfaction  of  its  religious  needs,  and  it  is  essential 
that  the  radical  difference  between  faith,  as  the 
central  element  of  the  religious  life,  and  dogma, 
as  an  intellectual  belief,  should  be  sharply  discrim- 
inated, since  it  is  only  by  such  a  discrimination 
that  the  demand  of  faith  can  be  understood  and 
met.  Even  to-day  men  are  insisting  that  dog- 
matic beliefs  are  of  the  essence  of  religion  and 
religious  experience,  and  many  are  halting  between 
two  opinions,  skeptical  as  to  the  dogmas  of  tradi- 
tional Christianity,  and  yet  earnest  to  find  the 
true  basis  of  Christian  faith.  Before  the  religious 
hunger  of  the  age  can  be  satisfied,  the  dilemma  as 
to  the  relation  of  faith  and  dogma  must  cease  to 
be  a  stumbling  stone  and  rock  of  offense.  The 
truth,  then,  must  be  squarely  told,  viz.,  that  intel- 
lectual belief  is  not,  in  any  sense,  of  the  essence  of 
religion  or  of  the  religious  life.  The  vital  question 
of  religion  is  not  what  a  man  believes,  how  much 
or  how  little,  but  what  the  disposition  of  his  heart 
and  will  is  toward  those  objects  of  faith  that  lie 
within  the  range  of  his  own  moral  consciousness. 
The  question  of  the  content  of  that  moral  conscious- 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT    205 

ness  and  of  the  unfolding  of  it  in  dogmatic  belief 
is  a  wholly  distinct  and  secondary  matter.  A  man 
may  give  very  vague  and  indistinct  answers  to 
such  questions  as,  Who  is  God  ?  Does  He  exist  in 
unity  or  in  trinity  ?  Was  Christ  human  or  divine 
or  was  he  both  human  and  divine?  Was  the 
atonement  sacrificial  or  moral  ?  and  yet  be  a  hum- 
bler, more  seK-sacrificing  Christian  than  another 
man  who  can  answer  aU  these  questions  in  the 
most  orthodox  fashion.  Yet  it  goes  without  say- 
ing that  intellectual  belief  has  a  very  close  relation 
to  religious  faith,  and  that  clear  apprehensions  of 
truth  are  of  great  religious  value.  But  it  has  its 
own  distinct  place  and  function  in  religious  expe- 
rience and  comes  into  it  in  its  own  time  and  way. 
As  a  rule  it  is  a  slow  development  under  a  pro- 
cess of  spiritual  illumination  and  growing  insight 
into  the  life  and  teaching  of  Christ,  together  with 
other  forms  of  divine  revelation  in  nature  and  his- 
tory. But  such  increase  of  knowledge  and  convic- 
tion should  never  be  confounded  with  those  Chris- 
tian graces  of  faith,  hope,  and  love  which  are  the 
essence  of  religion.  Life  and  the  science  or  phi- 
losophy of  life  are  two  very  different  things.  Just 
as  different  are  religion  and  its  dogmatic  or  theo- 
logical expressions  in  a  creed.  The  one  is  the 
living  experience  of  a  human  soul,  the  other  is  an 
abstract,  lifeless  formula,  except  so  far  as  it  is 
made  alive  by  the  soul's  use  of  it. 

It  is  a  conunon  impression  that  somehow  a  the- 
ology or  philosophy,  in  other  words,  a  more  or  less 


206        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

systematized  conception  of  truth,  is  necessary  for 
every  preacher  of  the  gospel,  not  to  say  for  every 
Christian  believer.  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott  once  told 
a  body  of  seminary  students  that  every  minister 
should  have  a  philosophy,  but  that  he  should  not 
preach  it;  which  seems  to  assume  that  a  set  of 
dogmas  is  a  vital  element  of  religion,  if  not  of  the 
preaching  of  it.  I  must  take  issue  with  Dr.  Ab- 
bott if  I  understand  him,  Not  only  is  it  true  that 
ministers  should  not  preach  philosophy,  but,  fur- 
ther, it  is  not  essential  that  they  should  have  any 
definite  philosophy  at  all.  The  gospel  of  Christ 
and  any  human  philosophy  are  as  wide  apart  as 
the  poles.  Woe  would  be  to  many  a  preacher  if  it 
were  not  so.  Truly  philosophical  minds  are  rare. 
A  metaphysical  system  is  one  of  the  most  difficult 
accomplishments  of  human  thought,  and  at  the  best 
it  must  be  incomplete  and  even  fragmentary;  for 
a  true  philosophy  of  nature,  man,  and  God  must 
rest  on  the  fullest  evidence  drawn  from  all  these 
sources ;  and,  as  yet  in  fact,  the  evidence  is  not  all 
in.  The  chances  are  that  a  young  minister's  phi- 
losophy would  be  a  very  poor  one,  and  a  poor  one 
is  worse  than  none  at  all.  In  truth  a  man's  philoso- 
phy is  a  matter  of  slow  evolution  and  should  be  left 
to  grow  of  itself.  A  manufactured  one  becomes  a 
cage  for  the  soul  as  it  advances  in  religious  expe- 
rience and  knowledge.  This  is  not  a  merely  spec- 
ulative question.  If  it  were  I  should  not  dwell  on 
it.  It  is  one  that  affects  the  practical  faith  of 
men.    Many  of  the  articles  of  the  Christian  creeds 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT     207 

are  metaphysical  propositions  of  the  extremest 
sort,  and  yet  they  have  been  preached  in  the  past 
as  though  they  were  the  very  essence  of  the  gospel. 
These  metaphysical  propositions  about  God  and 
man  may  all  be  true,  but,  if  true,  they  belong  to  a 
philosophy  of  religion,  not  to  Christ's  gospel,  which 
is  religion  itself.  Here  again  historical  criticism 
is  doing  its  necessary  destructive  work  and  thus 
preparing  the  way  for  a  new  type  of  preaching  as 
well  as  of  faith. 

But  this  work  of  the  historical  critic  is  not  yet 
complete.  So  deeply  fixed  in  our  religious  tradi- 
tions is  the  idea  that  somehow  theological  belief  is 
an  essential  and  vital  point  of  true  religion  that 
even  our  most  liberal  leaders  are  still  misleading 
themselves  and  others  with  it,  even  while  pronoun- 
cing against  it.  The  employment  of  the  term 
"  faith  "  in  two  different  senses,  as  came  to  be  the 
case  with  the  original  Greek  term  irto-Tts,  has  done 
much  to  perpetuate  this  confusion  in  the  minds  of 
men.  There  is  not  a  word  in  religious  and  the- 
ological nomenclature  that  has  been  so  abused  in 
preaching  and  in  Christian  literature  as  this  word 
"faith."  The  classic  Greek  word  irta-rus  always 
meant  a  purely  intellectual  act.  In  Plato,  for  ex- 
ample, it  is  used  for  a  lower  form  of  knowledge. 
Such  is  sometimes  its  meaning  in  the  Bible.  But 
Christ  and  his  apostles  put  the  word  to  a  new  use. 
It  came  to  mean  a  moral  and  religious  act  of  the 
heart  and  will ;  as  when  Christ  said  to  the  woman, 
"Thy  faith  hath  saved  thee."     This  is  its  true 


208        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Christian  meaning.  But  when  the  classical  Greek 
intellectualism  began  to  exercise  its  moulding  power 
in  Christian  faith  and  thought,  as  it  did  even  from 
the  time  of  Paul,  the  meaning  of  faith  returned 
largely  to  its  classic  pagan  sense,  and  in  Christian 
theology  came  to  be  an  act  of  the  intellect  in  the 
acceptance  of  dogmas.  This  is  illustrated  in  the 
ancient  creeds,  which  are  declarations  of  belief  in 
certain  intellectual  propositions  as  to  the  meta- 
physical nature  of  God  and  of  his  mediational 
work  through  Christ.  This  intellectualizing  of 
the  term  "  faith  "  would  have  done  no  harm,  if  its 
theological  character  had  been  clearly  kept  in  mind 
and  not  been  confounded  with  faith  in  its  Chris- 
tian evangelical  meaning.  But  this  was  prevented 
by  the  intensely  dogmatic  tendencies  of  the  early 
church.  Orthodoxy  became  the  watchword,  and 
intellectual  assent  to  creeds  became  the  great  test, 
and  from  that  time  dovm  to  the  present  day  the 
Greek  pagan  meaning  of  faith  has  supplanted  the 
Christian  meaning,  or  the  two  meanings  have  been 
inextricably  mixed  together.  Take  for  illustration 
the  phrase  "  articles  of  faith  "  in  such  common  use. 
Faith  of  course  here  means  a  set  of  intellectual 
propositions  which  are  to  be  subscribed  to.  Such 
faith  is  essentially  beliefs  and  is  very  far  from  ex- 
pressing the  "  faith  "  of  the  penitent  woman,  who 
affirmed  nothing  concerning  her  beliefs,  but  simply 
showed  the  state  of  her  heart  by  her  conduct.  If 
the  term  "  belief "  could  be  substituted  for  faith 
where  the  intellectual  act  is  referred  to,  and  the 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      209 

term  "  faith  "  be  left  to  represent  the  moral  act  as 
Christ  used  it,  much  confusion  and  misunderstand- 
ing might  be  avoided. 

But  there  are  many  who  will  defend  this  double 
use  of  the  term  "  faith,"  insisting  that  Christian 
faith  involves  essentially  the  exercise  of  the  reason 
as  well  as  of  the  heart  and  wiU,  or,  in  other  words, 
that  religion  in  its  very  essence  is  not  merely  the 
spirit  of  obedience  and  love  and  sacrifice,  but  also 
and  equally  the  assent  of  the  mind  to  a  creed  that 
contains,  or  is  supposed  to  contain,  the  essentials 
of  Christian  truth.  Here  at  last  we  come  to  the 
issue  that  is  still  squarely  made  by  the  whole  body 
of  traditionalists,  even  by  some  who  would  scarcely 
wish  to  be  counted  in  that  section  of  Christian 
thinkers.  Dogma  is  of  the  essence  of  faith,  they 
all  say,  though  in  varying  language,  and  with  more 
or  less  modification.  Hence  it  is  claimed  that 
faith  may  properly  be  used  in  a  double  sense,  and 
mean  indiscriminately  the  acceptance  of  a  body  of 
doctrine,  or  the  body  of  doctrine  itself,  as  well  as  a 
Christian  experience  and  life.  Let  me  once  more 
remind  my  readers  that  I  speak  as  a  historical 
observer,  not  as  a  theologian ;  but  from  the  his- 
torical standpoint  I  am  moved  to  say  that  this 
assumption  lies  at  the  very  root  of  the  religious 
skepticism  of  the  age,  and  that  the  demand  of  the 
age  for  a  new  basis  of  faith  and  religious  life  will 
not  be  met  until  its  falsity  has  been  thoroughly 
exposed  and  the  assumption  itself  cast  aside  com- 
pletely from  religious  language. 


210        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

In  illustration  of  what  has  been  said,  I  wish 
to  call  attention  to  a  distinguished  writer  who  in 
many  ways  represents  a  quite  radical  phase  of  reli- 
gious thought,  but  who  on  this  point  seems  to  me 
to  hold  an  inconsistent  and  unsatisfactory  position. 
I  refer  to  Auguste  Sabatier,  professor  of  theology 
in  the  University  of  Paris.  "  Esquisse  d'une  Phi- 
losophic de  la  Keligion "  is  a  work  that  is  per- 
meated with  the  historical  spirit  and  is  really 
written  in  the  interest  of  a  thoroughly  scientific 
view  of  religion,  in  its  origin  and  development. 
As  a  whole  the  sketch  is  admirable.  Professor 
Sabatier's  description  of  Biblical  or  religious  faith 
and  of  its  distortion  into  a  synonym  for  orthodoxy 
is  weU  put.  "  Faith  which  in  the  Bible  was  an  act 
of  confidence  in  God  and  of  consecration  to  Him, 
has  become  an  intellectual  adhesion  to  a  historical 
testimony  or  to  a  doctrinal  formula.  A  mortal 
dualism  thus  arises  in  religion.  It  is  admitted  that 
orthodoxy  can  exist  independently  of  piety,  and 
that  one  can  obtain  and  possess  the  object  of  faith 
without  regard  to  the  conditions  which  faith  pre- 
supposes, and  even  do  real  service  to  divine  truth 
while  being  at  heart  a  wicked  man."  Sabatier 
also  states  clearly  the  radical  difference  between 
faith  and  dogma.  "The  affirmation  of  piety  is 
essentially  different  from  the  scientific  explanation 
of  it."  He  declares  that  there  can  be  no  conflict 
between  faith  and  knowledge,  since  they  belong  to 
two  different  orders  or  planes,  viz.,  the  moral  and 
the  intellectual.    His  definition  of  dogma  is  wholly 


DEMAND  OP  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      211 

in  accord  with  tMs  declaration.  "  Dogma  is  defined 
in  its  strict  sense  as  one  or  several  doctrinal  pro- 
positions which  have  been  made,  by  means  of  deci- 
sions of  competent  authority,  an  object  of  faith 
and  rule  of  belief  and  life." 

But  now  comes  a  remarkable  change  of  state- 
ment. Sabatier  has  previously  insisted  on  the 
essential  difference  between  faith  and  dogma,  and 
discriminated  the  two  orders  to  which  they  belong, 
but  now  he  undertakes  a  defense  of  dogma  against 
those  who  "  wish  to  suppress  the  whole  doctrinal 
definition  of  the  Christian  faith."  A  new  note  is 
here  struck,  and  it  is  revealed  in  the  changed  use 
of  the  term  "faith."  "The  Christian  faith"  is 
no  longer  faith  in  its  subjective  sense  of  piety,  but 
faith  objectively  considered,  in  other  words,  the 
objects  or  dogmas  of  faith.  Faith,  then,  is  dogma. 
There  is,  he  asserts,  an  organic  and  necessary 
connection  between  faith,  or  piety,  and  dogma. 
"Dogma  has  three  elements,  a  religious  element 
which  proceeds  from  piety,  an  intellectual  or  phi- 
losophical element,  and  an  element  of  authority 
which  comes  from  the  Christ."  "  Dogma  has  its 
first  root  in  religion.  In  all  positive  religion  there 
is  an  internal  element  and  an  external  element,  a 
soul  and  a  body."  Thus  Sabatier  places  himself 
on  the  traditional  ground  that  faith  and  dogma 
are  essentially  united,  and  that  the  double  meaning 
given  to  the  term  "  faith  "  is  proper  and  warranted 
by  history.  We  are  now  prepared  to  hear  him 
say :  "  Say  then  no  more :  Christianity  is  a  life, 


212         EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

therefore  it  is  not  a  doctrine.  This  is  to  reason 
very  badly.  One  must  rather  say,  Christianity  is  a 
life,  therefore  it  ought  to  engender  doctrine,  siace 
man  cannot  live  his  life  without  a  doctrine  of  it." 
Hence  his  conclusion :  "  Dogma,  therefore,  is  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  the  propagation  and  upbuilding 
of  the  religious  life." 

The  real  explanation  of  this  curious  contretemps 
is  that  Sabatier  is  a  dogmatic  theologian,  and  intent 
on  proving  that  dogmatic  theology  is  an  essential 
element  in  the  life  of  Christianity.  His  general 
premise  that  dogma  is  subject  to  the  universal 
law  of  evolution,  and  so  is  continually  changing, 
is  of  course  historical  and  scientific.  His  further 
contention  that  an  intellectual  acquaintance  with 
religious  truth  is  of  great  moral  value  cannot  be 
gainsaid.  But  when,  in  the  ardor  of  his  advocacy, 
he  pushes  the  relation  of  faith  and  dogma  to  the 
point  of  declaring  them  organically  and  essentially 
united  like  root  and  branch,  soul  and  body,  so  that 
each  involves  the  other  and  is  a  part  of  the  other, 
he  is  guilty  of  an  inconsistency  with  his  own  fun- 
damental historical  premise  upon  which  his  whole 
volimie  rests.  Faith  and  dogma,  the  free  volitions 
of  the  heart  and  the  ratiocinative  conclusions  of 
the  head,  life  and  the  philosophy  of  life,  the  con- 
crete and  the  abstract,  cannot  be  juggled  with  in 
this  way.  To  be  sure  soul  and  body  are  closely 
united.  Body  is  itseK  dependent  on  food  and 
drink,  and  so  it  may  be  said  that  the  soul  is  inti- 
mately related  through  the  body  to  these  outside 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      213 

material  elements.  But  soul  is  not  body  nor  is 
body  the  food  on  which  it  lives,  and  it  is  equally 
true  that  "  the  kingdom  of  God,"  which  is  made 
up  of  pious  souls,  is  not  meat  and  drink  or  dogma 
or  philosophy,  but  "  love,  peace,  and  joy  in  the 
Holy  Ghost."  The  truth  is  there  is  a  psychologi- 
cal fallacy  underlying  this  whole  way  of  viewing 
the  relations  of  faith  and  dogma.  The  soid,  though 
organically  one  and  having  but  a  single  self -con- 
sciousness, is  yet  composed  of  several  completely 
distinct  faculties,  and  the  action  of  these  faculties 
is  always  clearly  distinguishable.  Consciousness 
never  confounds  these  different  orders  of  activity. 
It  never  mixes  acts  of  reason  or  memory  or  imagi- 
nation or  desire  or  will  heterogeneously  together. 
An  illogical  piece  of  reasoning  or  a  lapse  of  the 
memory  is  never  charged  to  the  account  of  the 
free  will  and  made  a  burden  on  the  conscience. 
These  actions  belong  to  different  "  orders  "  of  the 
soul,  to  use  Sabatier's  own  term.  Faith  is  a  moral 
act  and  condition,  it  is  a  movement  of  the  free 
wiU,  it  belongs  to  the  moral  order.  Dogma  is  an 
intellectual  process,  it  belongs  wholly  to  the  intel- 
lectual order.  To  confound  them,  to  say  that  there 
is  a  dogmatic  element  in  faith,  or  a  faith  element 
in  dogma,  is  like  saying  that  a  mathematical 
blunder  or  a  logical  fallacy  is  the  same  thing  as 
hatred  or  disobedience.  Such  a  psychology  is 
wholly  seK-destructive.  To  say  that  these  differ- 
ent acts  of  the  soul  are  all  forms  of  consciousness, 
and  so  essentially  one,  is  to  play  with  words.    Even 


214        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

bodily  actions  or  injuries  all  come  within  the  sur- 
vey of  consciousness.  Is  a  hurt  to  a  limb,  or  a 
movement  of  a  finger,  therefore,  the  same  in  nature 
or  order  with  an  act  of  memory  or  will  ?  The 
most  radical  line  of  cleavage  in  the  soul  is  that 
between  the  free  wiU  with  its  categorical  impera- 
tives of  conscience  and  the  intellectual  powers,  — 
in  other  words,  between  the  volitional  consenting 
faculties  and  the  faculties  of  knowledge  and  as- 
sent. They  work  in  harmony,  in  aU  sorts  of  clos- 
est relationship  and  mutual  influence;  but  they 
are  radically  differentiated  by  the  fact  that  the 
acts  of  the  moral  order  are  under  a  law  of  free- 
dom and  responsibility  and  moral  judgment,  while 
the  acts  of  the  intellectual  faculties,  as  such,  have 
no  moral  character  and  come  imder  no  law  of 
moral  responsibility,  being  under  laws  of  a  wholly 
different  order.  The  law  under  which  the  mind 
reaches  conclusions  through  its  faculties  of  abstrac- 
tion and  generalization,  or  forms  its  convictions 
based  on  evidence,  is  one  of  necessity.  Given  a 
certain  amount  of  evidence,  the  mind  becomes  con- 
vinced inevitably.  There  is  no  freedom  or  respon- 
sibility attached  to  it.  It  is  true  that  the  will  may 
interfere  with  the  normal  action  of  the  intellect, 
and,  by  means  of  moral  presuppositions  and  pre- 
judices and  determinations,  may  force  the  mind  to 
a  contrary  result.  So  that  there  is  a  degree  of 
truth  in  the  adage :  "  A  man  convinced  against  his 
wiU  is  of  the  same  opinion  still."  But  in  such  a 
case  a  violence  is  done  to  nature.     The  laws  of 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      215 

evidence,  or  of  logical  premise  and  conclusion,  or 
of  mathematical  axioms,  may  be  tampered  with 
and  nullified  for  the  time,  under  the  stress  of  moral 
passion  or  determination,  but  the  laws  themselves 
are  fundamental  to  man's  intellectual  nature,  and 
when  left  to  themselves  work  necessarily  to  fixed 
results.  The  will  may  compel  the  soul  to  accept 
a  historical  legend  as  fact,  but  when  the  mind  is 
left  free  to  act  according  to  its  own  laws,  and  the 
historical  evidence  is  allowed  to  come  before  it, 
the  result  is  a  necessary  one  that  the  legend  should 
be  seen  to  be  a  legend.  The  moral  responsibility 
for  either  result  lies  not  with  the  purely  intellec- 
tual powers,  but  with  the  free  will. 

There  is  great  confusion  in  many  minds  on  this 
point.  The  acts  of  the  intellect  under  its  own 
laws  in  the  pursuit  of  knowledge  are  often  treated 
as  morally  accountable  and  sinful.  Men  have  been 
put  to  death  for  a  conviction  to  which  they  were 
brought  by  necessary  laws  of  reasoning  or  evi- 
dence, as  if  such  intellectual  convictions  were  free 
and  accountable.  Most  of  the  heresies  of  history 
have  been  of  this  sort.  The  mistake  has  been  in 
confounding  two  distinct  orders  of  the  soul's  facul- 
ties, —  the  order  that  works  under  a  law  of  neces- 
sity, and  the  order  that  is  morally  free  and  there- 
fore accountable.  A  historical  mistake  or  an 
illogical  philosophical  tenet  is  not  a  sin,  since,  by 
itself,  it  has  no  moral  quality.  Sin  comes  in  when 
the  soul  in  the  exercise  of  its  moral  freedom  abuses 
the  faculties  of  knowledge  that  are  under  its  sway 


216         EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

and  turns  them  to  wrong  uses,  as,  for  example, 
when  a  man  in  the  interest  of  a  false  dogma  inten- 
tionally distorts  history.  A  clear  understanding 
of  the  psychological  laws  and  facts  of  human  na- 
ture is  above  all  things  needed  in  this  matter.  It 
is  certainly  strange  that  such  a  profound  thinker 
as  Professor  Sabatier  shoidd  be  guilty  of  incon- 
sistency and  inaccuracy  here.  For  he  has  struck 
the  keynote  of  psychological  truth,  in  his  doctrine 
of  the  two  "  orders  "  of  soul  activity.  Acts  of  the 
heart  and  will  and  those  of  the  intellect  are  in  his 
view  heterogeneous.  Then  of  course  piety  and 
knowledge,  faith  and  dogma,  are  heterogeneous, 
and  to  confound  them  is  to  do  violence  to  the 
psychological  laws  of  the  soul  itself.  M.  Sabatier 
sees  this  plainly,  and  he  well  describes  the  result 
of  turning  faith,  which  is  an  act  of  the  wlQ,  into 
an  intellectual  act,  that  is,  a  dogma,  as  "  a  mortal 
dualism  in  religion."  It  is  just  that.  It  intro- 
duces a  moral  schism  into  the  soul  which  is  fatal 
to  aU  healthy  spiritual  life.  This  is  the  vital  part 
of  Sabatier's  book,  and  for  it  I  thank  him.  As  to 
the  contretemps  by  which  he  attempts  to  build  a 
foundation  for  dogma  in  faith  itself,  it  is  an  anti- 
nomy which  must  be  left  to  the  fate  that  inevita- 
bly overtakes  all  false  reasoning. 

I  wonder  whether  Dr.  Sabatier  comprehends 
the  fuU  force  of  his  own  cardinal  positions.  He 
allows  that  there  may  be  a  barren  and  morally 
worthless  orthodoxy  without  piety  or  faith,  but 
does  he  also  see  that  it  is  equally  true  that  there 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      217 

may  be  a  genuine  and  living  faith  and  piety  with- 
out orthodoxy  ?  I  am  not  sure.  But  of  course  it 
is  so.  Two  heterogeneous  acts  and  conditions  can 
have  no  moral  relation  with  each  other  that  shall 
make  the  existence  of  one  depend  on  the  existence 
of  the  other.  There  may  be  faith  without  ortho- 
doxy, just  as  easily  as  there  may  be  orthodoxy 
without  faith ;  and  it  is  this  simple  truth  based  on 
a  sound  psychology  that  our  age  is  feeling  after 
and  beginning  to  realize  and  insist  upon  as  the 
starting-point  of  its  new  religious  faith  and  life. 
The  power  of  that  word  "  orthodox "  which  has 
been  such  a  spell  on  the  minds  of  men,  is  already 
broken,  and  it  only  remains  for  them,  in  the  exer- 
cise of  their  new  freedom,  to  learn  from  history 
and  experience  and  from  Christ's  own  lips  and 
life  the  fullness  of  meaning  there  is  in  the  divine 
gospel  of  God's  free  love  to  man  and  of  man's  free 
love  to  God. 

I  am  anticipating  a  little,  but  I  cannot  forbear 
here  to  say  that  it  will  be  a  great  boon  to  theologi- 
cal and  philosophical  speculation,  when  all  ques- 
tions of  dogma  shall  be  wholly  separated  in  the 
minds  of  men,  as  they  ought  to  be,  from  all  ques- 
tions of  practical  religion  and  faith.  Theology  is 
a  science.  It  is  a  work  of  the  mind.  Why  then 
should  it  not  be  treated  as  all  other  sciences  are 
treated,  and  be  allowed  the  same  liberty  of  inves- 
tigation. Why  should  charges  of  moral  heresy  and 
sin  and  wickedness  be  brought  against  a  worker 
in  theological  science  any  more  than  against  other 


218        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

scientists.  All  science  is  under  the  same  intellec- 
tual laws,  and  these  laws,  as  we  have  seen,  work 
on  the  same  lines  of  logical,  mathematical,  eviden- 
tial necessity.  Why  should  a  moral  and  religious 
significance  be  attached  to  the  labors  of  one  class 
of  scientists  rather  than  to  those  of  another  class. 
There  is  but  one  reason  to  be  given  for  an  affirma- 
tive answer,  viz.,  that  faith  and  dogma,  religion 
and  theology,  are  radically  one,  so  that  a  man  can- 
not be  pious  without  being  orthodox,  even  though 
a  man  may  be  orthodox  without  being  pious,  as 
facts  prove  beyond  dispute.  But  with  this  false 
assumption  taken  out  of  the  way,  what  remains 
but  that  theology  as  a  science  should  be  allowed 
its  full  scientific  freedom?  This  is  what  is  cer- 
tainly coming,  and  what  benefits  wiU  accrue  to 
theological  investigation  I  need  not  say.  Freedom 
of  scientific  teaching  is  to  be  the  educational  watch- 
word of  the  future,  and  out  of  it  will  come  a  new 
evolution  of  knowledge  and  thought  that  wiU  tran- 
scend immensely  all  previous  attainments. 

I  cannot  leave  this  point  without  alluding  to 
the  pecuhar  position  of  history  as  a  science.  Un- 
fortunately for  the  full  freedom  of  historical  study 
and  teaching,  there  is  in  the  traditional  creeds 
and  theology  of  the  Christian  church  a  complete 
heterogeneous  mixture  of  theological  speculative 
propositions  and  of  supposed  historical  facts.  This 
brings  theology  within  the  purview  of  historical 
investigation.  The  miraculous  virgin  birth  of 
Christ,  and  the  other  miraculous  or  supernatural 


DEMAND  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  SPIRIT      219 

events  that  are  recorded  in  connection  with  it, 
Christ's  own  miracles  and  his  miraculous  resurrec- 
tion and  ascension,  come  strictly  within  the  sphere 
of  history  and  so  are  subjects  of  historical  and 
critical  scrutiny,  and  yet  they  are  held  as  dogmas 
of  Christian  belief,  and  supposed  to  lie  at  the  very 
foundation  of  the  Christian  religion.  Thus  the 
path  of  the  historical  student  and  teacher  has 
been  surrounded  with  great  difficulties  and  even 
hazards.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  to-day  history 
is  more  exposed  to  the  attacks  of  theological  dog- 
matism than  theology  itseK,  inasmuch  as  the  last 
defenses  of  traditionalism  are  of  a  historical  and 
critical  rather  than  philosophical  character.  The 
theological  teacher  may  theologize  with  fuU  free- 
dom, if  he  keeps  safely  off  historical  ground,  but 
the  historical  teacher  has  no  such  option.  He 
cannot  retreat  behind  the  clouds  of  metaphysics, 
but  must  come  out  into  the  historical  open  and 
meet  squarely  the  historical  theological  problems 
that  arise  inevitably  in  his  path,  or  dodge  them 
utterly  and  commit  hari-kari  with  his  historical 
conscience.  But,  happily  for  historians  as  weU  as 
theologians,  the  basis  for  the  new  faith  that  his- 
tory itself  has  already  laid  wiU  be  their  refuge  and 
salvation.  The  time  is  at  hand  when  the  real 
heretics  will  be  seen  to  be,  not  historical  and  the- 
ological investigators,  but  men  of  uncharitable  and 
bitter  spirit  and  of  bad  lives.  It  is  no  wonder 
that  men  of  the  world  look  with  amazement  on  the 
theological  controversies  that  still  afdict  some  parts 


220        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

of  Christendom.  A  writer  in  the  "Evangelist" 
recently  stated  that  Mr.  Joseph  H.  Choate,  the 
noted  lawyer  and  present  ambassador  to  England, 
declared,  in  reference  to  the  Briggs  case  in  the 
Presbyterian  church,  that  "  he  could  not  make  head 
or  tail  out  of  it,  and  could  not  understand  how 
rational  beings  should  get  into  such  a  tempest  over 
a  matter  of  purely  speculative  opinions,  with  but 
the  slightest  bearing  upon  life  and  character." 
Thus  already  our  age,  in  the  persons  of  its  most 
intelligent  laymen,  is  reaching  a  correct  diagnosis 
of  dogmatic  questions  and  of  the  bitter  controver- 
sies that  grow  out  of  them,  and  sits  in  moral  judg- 
ment upon  them. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE   DEMAND   OF   THE   INTELLECTUAL   SPIRIT 

We  are  now  prepared  to  consider  tlie  third  de- 
mand of  our  age,  that  of  the  reason  in  its  more 
restricted  sense  of  representing  all  our  faculties  of 
gathering  and  coordinating  knowledge.  For  there 
is  a  double  meaning  of  the  term  "  reason  "  as  it  is 
usually  employed  in  theological  and  philosophical 
literature.  It  often  stands  for  the  whole  moral 
consciousness,  including  not  only  the  ratiocinative 
and  logical  powers,  but  also  those  moral  intuitions 
and  principles  of  determination  by  means  of  which 
the  soul  is  able  to  sit  in  judgment  on  all  questions 
of  religious  truth  and  duty.  In  this  larger  sense 
the  reason  covers  the  two  spheres  of  religion  proper, 
or  faith,  and  of  dogma  in  the  various  forms  of 
theology  and  philosophy.  Such  was  its  meaning 
in  the  great  controversy  between  Romanist  and 
Protestant  as  to  the  question  whether  faith  was 
before  reason  or  reason  before  faith.  The  Romish 
doctrine  was  that  orthodox  religious  belief  was 
determined  by  an  ecclesiastical  authority  set  over 
the  individual  reason,  and  not  by  the  reason  itself, 
which  must  be  subjected  to  such  authority  and  obe- 
diently interpret  and  defend  its  ex  cathedra  decla- 


222        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

rations.  The  Protestant  position  was  that  man's 
private  reason  or  moral  consciousness  was  the  pri- 
mary tribunal  before  which  aU  questions  of  reli- 
gious belief  and  duty  must  come  for  settlement,  and 
that  its  verdicts  must  be  ultimate  and  final  for  the 
individual  soul.  It  was  a  sad  day  for  Protestant- 
ism when  the  intensely  dogmatic  spirit  of  the  sev- 
enteenth century  led  to  a  retreat  from  the  original 
ground  of  protest  of  the  Lutheran  reformers  back 
to  the  very  principle  of  authority  which  had  caused 
the  breach.  The  only  difference  then  was  that, 
while  Catholicism  made  the  church  in  the  person 
of  its  ecclesiastical  head  the  ultimate  basis  of  au- 
thority, Protestantism  put  the  Bible  in  place  of  the 
pope.  But  both  parties  agreed  in  deposing  man's 
reason  or  moral  consciousness  from  its  throne  of 
final  appeal  and  decision.  In  such  a  view  reason 
stands  for  conscience  with  aU  its  powers  of  moral 
insight  and  judgment  and  categorical  imperative, 
to  use  the  very  suggestive  definition  of  Kant. 

But  there  is  another  meaning  of  reason  that  is 
equally  common,  where  it  is  restricted  to  the  purely 
intellectual  side  or  order  of  the  soul,  and  stands  for 
the  reflective  and  reasoning  powers  of  the  mind, 
in  other  words,  the  faculty  of  abstract  thought.  In 
this  view  reason  stands  over  against  the  conscience 
and  will  and  moral  region  of  man's  consciousness, 
and  should  never  be  confounded  with  it.  I  am  here 
compelled,  however,  to  observe  that  theological  lit- 
erature is  permeated  with  this  confusion,  and  that 
the  term  "reason,"  almost  as  much  as  the  term 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    223 

"  faith,"  has  been  sadly  abused  in  the  interest  of 
dogmatism  and  dogmatic  authority.  It  is  on  this 
account  that  I  have  made  the  above  discrimination. 
A  critical  historical  dictionary  of  theological  and 
philosophical  terms  brought  down  to  date  would 
prove  most  valuable  for  present  uses.  For  what 
is  needed  now  above  all  things  is  a  clear  intelli- 
gence of  the  questions  in  issue,  based  on  historical 
and  critical  knowledge.  The  time  has  gone  by 
when  either  form  of  the  claim  of  authority  can  be 
asserted  or  listened  to ;  but  the  murky  fogs  of  the- 
ological traditionalism  are  stiU  dense,  and  men  are 
left  in  doubt  where  the  real  guideboards  of  truth 
are,  or  what  the  signals  mean.  Eead  almost  any 
one  of  the  recent  publications  in  the  theological  or 
religious  field,  and  if  the  fog  grows  thicker  as  you 
proceed,  as  will  very  likely  be  the  case,  if  I  may 
judge  from  my  own  experience,  be  sure  the  reason 
is  that  such  terms  as  faith,  reason,  incarnation,  di- 
vine, trinity,  are  being  juggled  with  and  metamor- 
phosed to  such  a  degree  that  the  very  countersigns 
which  ought  to  lead  the  reader  on  into  the  light 
only  serve  to  leave  him  helpless,  "in  wandering 
mazes  lost." 

With  the  ground  thus  cleared  I  proceed  to  con- 
sider the  demand  of  the  intellectual  or  rational 
time  spirit.  It  is  to  be  noted  at  once  that  the 
intellectual  curiosity  and  inquisitiveness  of  our  age 
has  been  largely  drawn  into  the  channels  of  scien- 
tific and  historical  research.  The  result  has  been 
that  the  tide  has  turned  strongly  away  from  meta- 


224        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

physical  and  philosophical  studies,  and  there  is 
little  evidence  yet  of  any  reaction.  It  is  true  we 
hear  frequent  prophecies  of  a  speedy  change. 
There  are  those  who  are  calling  loudly  for  a  reju- 
venation of  philosophical  theology.  But  they  are 
only  voices  in  the  wilderness.  So  far  is  this  age 
from  being  metaphysical  or  theological,  or  even 
willing  to  lend  an  ear  to  such  discussions,  that  the 
very  reverse  is  true.  The  prejudice  against  the 
whole  metaphysical  method  of  surveying  truth  is 
the  one  of  all  most  deeply  and  firmly  fixed  in  the 
minds  of  the  masses  of  intelligent  men  and  women ; 
and  this  prejudice  is  natural  and  well  grounded. 
The  spirit  of  the  age,  as  we  have  seen,  is  critical 
and  destructive  in  aQ  matters  of  theological  tradi- 
tion, and  while  the  work  of  destruction  is  still 
going  on  there  can  be  little  interest  in  any  recon- 
structive process.  Men  will  not  build  a  bridge 
over  a  stream  while  they  are  still  in  doubt  whether 
it  should  be  crossed  at  all.  Further,  historical 
criticism  has  brought  to  light  the  fact  that  the 
very  foundations  of  traditional  philosophy  and 
theology  are  built  largely  on  unhistorical  assump- 
tions. Is  it  any  wonder,  then,  that  the  age,  so 
possessed  with  the  critical  spirit,  should  refuse  to 
accept  the  results  that  are  derived  from  such 
assumptions  ?  The  demand  must  plainly  be  for  new 
foundations  built  out  of  new  historical  material, 
and  according  to  a  new  historical  method.  The 
conservative  theologians,  who  are  so  averse  to  have 
a  single  stone  or  timber  removed  from  the  old 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    226 

structure  and  are  crying  continually  for  a  halt, 
plainly  have  made  a  very  bad  diagnosis  of  the 
case.  They  are  striving  to  save  as  much  of  the 
building  as  they  can,  and  would  begin  at  once  to 
patch  it  up  for  its  new  uses.  But  the  work  of  de- 
struction must  go  on  until  the  last  unhistorical 
tradition  has  been  unearthed  and  the  last  a  priori 
metaphysical  assumption  has  been  pulled  out  of  its 
hiding-place.  How  much  of  the  old  edifice  will 
be  left  is  no  present  concern  of  the  historical 
critic.  "  Take  no  thought  for  the  morrow  "  is  as 
true  in  historical  studies  as  in  everything  else. 
Truth  surely  is  in  no  danger.  God's  spiritual 
kingdom  cannot  be  hurt  by  the  axes  laid  at  the 
roots  of  historical  trees  that  have  grown  out  of 
pagan  and  mediaeval  Christian  ignorance  and 
superstition  and  have  for  too  many  centuries  only 
cumbered  the  ground.  Thus  it  grows  more  and 
more  clear  to  us  why  theological  reconstruction  is 
so  long  delayed.  Any  attempt  this  way  must  fail 
until  the  ground  is  ready  for  it.  It  is  for  this 
reason  that  the  demand  of  the  intellectual  spirit 
of  the  age  is  so  slow  in  voicing  itself.  Each  in  its 
own  order.  The  historical  demand  is  as  yet  only 
half  satisfied ;  the  religious  demand  still  waits  on 
the  fulfillment  of  the  historical;  the  intellectual 
demand  is  latest  in  logical  order,  and  must  be 
equally  so  in  time. 

But  if  the  time  is  not  yet,  it  is  surely  not  far 
off.  For  man  is,  in  his  fundamental  nature,  an 
inquisitive,  speculating,  metaphysical,  mystical  be- 


226        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITAKIANISM 

ing.  His  feet  must  always  be  planted  on  the  solid 
earth,  but  his  form  rises  upward  toward  the  skies, 
and  his  eyes  are  ever  stretching  their  gaze  away 
from  the  seen  and  temporal  to  the  unseen  and 
eternal.  The  soul  is  like  the  body  in  the  evolu- 
tion of  its  needs  and  demands.  The  purely  ani- 
mal wants  of  the  body  are  first  felt  and  listened 
to.  It  must  be  fed  and  clothed.  The  myth  of 
Adam  teaches  a  true  historical  lesson.  But  when 
these  lower  wants  are  supplied,  a  higher  order  of 
needs  begins  to  find  a  voice.  A  less  crude  diet 
and  more  artistic  clothing  are  demanded.  And 
so  the  order  of  bodily  demand  rises  until  human 
civilization  culminates  in  the  culinary  and  sartorial 
arts  of  to-day.  It  is  so  with  the  soul.  Its  earliest 
and  most  imperative  wants  are  those  that  spring 
from  the  lowest  order  of  its  faculties.  The  child 
first  uses  its  five  senses,  then  its  imagination,  then 
its  memory,  and  then  its  reflective  powers.  Later 
still,  self-consciousness  emerges  into  active  life. 
The  will  grows  moral,  and  the  religious  nature 
develops  apace.  Last  of  all,  the  eyes  of  the  soul 
begin  to  open  toward  the  wider  realms  of  being 
that  lie  about  it.  It  becomes  a  questioner. 
Whence?  Where?  Whither?  Those  old  eternal 
questions,  that  have  ever  stirred  the  curiosity  and 
troubled  the  religious  consciousness  of  men,  stimu- 
late thought  and  raise  new  inquiries.  Even  at 
twelve  years  of  age  Christ  had  entered  upon  that 
path  of  moral  consciousness  and  inquiry  from 
which  there  is  no  return,  and  was  found  by  his 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    227 

anxious  parents,  oblivious  of  all  things  else,  among 
the  Jewish  rabbis  asking  questions.  As  with  indi- 
viduals so  is  it  in  the  evolution  of  the  human  race. 
First,  the  stage  of  imaginative  mythologies,  then  a 
period  of  gnomic  and  ethical  poetry,  and  at  last 
the  age  of  philosophy.  Thus,  in  the  Greek  world, 
Homer  and  Hesiod  are  followed  by  Solon  and 
^schylus,  and  they  in  turn  by  Socrates  and  Plato. 
Such  always  is  the  order  of  history.  Each  age, 
too,  has  its  order.  Ours  is  no  exception.  Phi- 
losophy has  had  to  wait  its  time.  This  epoch  of 
ours  has  been  a  workman  laying  the  axe  at  the 
foundations  of  all  things  human,  and  patiently 
seeking  the  ,/ac^s  of  things.  Thus  its  eyes  have 
been  largely  downward  looking,  like  those  of  Aris- 
totle in  Raphael's  picture  of  the  School  of  Athens ; 
but  already  it  is  beginning  to  turn  them  upward, 
like  those  of  Plato,  whom  Raphael  painted  with 
hand  outstretched  toward  the  skies.  This  age  will 
and  must  have  its  Platonic  philosophical  period. 
The  same  old  questions  must  once  more  be  asked. 
For  with  the  new  light  the  old  answers  have  be- 
come unsatisfactory  and  obsolete.  Not  then  the 
old  Plato  redivivuSy  but  a  new  Plato  born.  New 
philosophical  wine  and  new  philosophical  bottles, 
a  new  philosophy  and  theology  even  from  founda- 
tion stone. 

But  some  one  will  ask  with  a  real  concern: 
"  Do  you  mean  that  the  old  metaphysical  and 
theological  systems  of  our  own  theological  fathers, 
that  have  been  wrought  out  so  conscientiously  and 


228        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

have  been  venerated  as  the  very  strongholds  of 
Christian  faith,  are  to  become  useless  and  obso- 
lete ?  "  Certainly,  yes,  must  be  the  frank  histor- 
ical reply.  Has  it  not  been  already  shown  that 
this  new  age  of  ours  is  not  merely  a  new  cycle  in 
an  old  evolution,  but  one  of  radical  revolution? 
What  is  a  radical  revolution,  if  not  one  that  works 
down  to  the  very  roots  and  bases  of  the  old  evolu- 
tion and  starts  anew  ?  The  new  theology  must  be 
radically  new,  for  it  must  start  and  build  on  a  new 
principle.  That  principle,  in  one  word,  is  induc- 
tion. Induction  is  that  law  and  method  of  discov- 
ering truth  which  proceeds  from  the  particular  to 
the  general ;  in  other  words,  from  individual  facts 
ascertained  by  valid  evidence  to  higher  and  wider 
generalizations,  as  drawn  out  by  valid  logical  pro- 
cesses. This  law  and  method  is  the  only  basis  of 
any  sound  philosophy.  It  is  what  is  known  as  the 
scientific  or  historical  method,  also  as  the  experi- 
mental a  posteriori  method,  —  baptized  with  the 
name  of  Bacon,  its  great  interpreter.  According 
to  this  law  and  method,  the  realities  which  lie  at 
the  basis  of  all  true  philosophies  or  theologies  are 
concrete  and  individual  things,  and  all  abstract 
thought  with  its  genera,  general  ideas  or  imiver- 
sals,  are  only  subjective  generalizations  and  have 
no  real  existence  except  in  the  minds  of  men. 
This  method  underlies,  as  we  have  seen,  the  new 
science  and  the  new  history.  Our  whole  modern 
civilization  is  built  upon  it.  But  the  philosophy 
and  theology  of  any  age  must  be  in  harmony  with 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    229 

its  science  and  history,  and  must  be  founded  on 
the  same  principles.  A  deductive  a  priori  phi- 
losophy cannot  be  brought  into  any  relationship 
with  an  inductive  a  posteriori  science  and  history. 
For  they  are  in  radical  antagonism.  It  is  this 
fact  that  explains  the  peculiar  condition  in  which 
theology  finds  itself  to-day.  Everything  else  ex- 
cept theology  has  adjusted  itself  to  the  new  in- 
ductive law  and  method  of  investigation.  Even 
speculative  philosophy,  outside  of  its  special  the- 
ological relations,  has  largely  followed  in  the  wake 
of  scientific  and  historical  criticism,  and,  planting 
itseK  on  the  Cartesian  premise,  "  cogito  ergo  sum^^^ 
has  essentially  accepted  the  inductive  principle.  I 
do  not  forget  that  the  Neo-Kantian  Hegelianism 
still  bases  itseK  upon  the  a  priori  deductive  prin- 
ciple, but  it  cannot  be  said  to  hold  the  field  to-day 
unchallenged,  and  its  sceptre  is  passing  into  other 
hands.  In  the  conservative  theological  camp  alone 
does  the  old  unscientific  metaphysical  method  still 
bear  unchallenged  sway.  Even  some  men  who 
accept  the  new  science  and  history  along  its  evolu- 
tionary lines,  in  all  fields  of  thought  except  the  the- 
ological, here  f  aU  back  on  the  traditional  a  priori 
metaphysics.  The  reason  is  they  cannot  bring 
themselves  to  surrender  wholly  the  old  theological 
system  with  its  speculative  dogmas  and  assump- 
tions, and  thus  are  compelled  to  remain  on  the  old 
foundations.  Traditional  orthodoxy  is  thus  forced 
into  sharp  and  radical  antagonism  to  the  ruling 
inductive  spirit  of  the  age.     For  this  age  demands 


230        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

that  religion  and  the  theological  expression  of  it 
be  based  on  the  same  law  and  method,  and  be  sub- 
jected to  the  same  critical  tests,  as  all  other  forms 
of  life  and  thought. 

This  antagonism  is  well  illustrated  in  the  atti- 
tude that  theology  has  taken  toward  science.  Men 
talk  about  the  conflict  between  science  and  reli- 
gion ;  as  if  science  were  by  its  very  nature  irreli- 
gious and  religion  were  in  its  nature  unscientific. 
But  no  such  conflict  is  possible.  What  is  religion 
but  the  testimony  and  expression  of  man's  moral 
consciousness  concerning  the  existence  and  char- 
acter of  divine  powers  above  him,  and  what  is 
science  but  the  testimony  of  nature  to  the  same 
religious  truths  ?  How  can  there  be  any  conflict 
between  two  different  forms  of  God's  self-revela- 
tion !  Paul  builded  better  than  he  knew  when 
he  wrote  that  "  the  invisible  things  of  God  since 
the  creation  of  the  world  are  clearly  seen,  being 
perceived  by  the  things  that  are  made,  even  his 
eternal  power  and  divinity."  How  wonderfully 
has  science  interpreted  and  illustrated  these  words, 
until  "  the  heavens  above  and  the  earth  beneath 
and  the  waters  under  the  earth  "  have  been  writ- 
ten all  over  with  the  evidences  of  God's  moral 
perfections.  Indeed,  the  religious  aspects  of  na- 
ture are  patent  to  any  eye  that  has  the  gift  of 
moral  vision.  A  few  evenings  since,  I  happened 
to  turn  my  eyes  upward  to  the  sky.  The  air  was 
unusually  clear,  and  the  summer  stars  glowed  with 
unusual  brightness.     Many  years  had  passed  since 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    231 

I  first  learned  to  pilot  my  way  from  constellation 
to  constellation  and  study  those  geometrical  con- 
figurations that  so  stirred  my  boyish  imagination. 
Maturer  years  have  only  increased  my  wonder  and 
admiration,  as  I  have  learned  through  recent  dis- 
coveries how  enormous  are  the  distances  of  these 
stars  from  each  other,  and  how  endless  are  their 
numbers.  But  what  impressed  me  that  evening 
was  the  fact  that  during  all  these  years  not  the 
slightest  change  of  position  of  a  single  one  of  these 
millions  of  worlds  was  discernible.  For  fifty  years 
not  one  star  has  moved  a  second's  point  from  its 
original  place.  Not  a  circle  or  square  or  triangle 
has  in  any  way  altered  its  shape.  And  all  this, 
be  it  noted,  when  these  stars  are  millions  on  mil- 
lions of  miles  apart,  and  are  millions  on  millions 
in  number.  Is  there  any  geometry  on  earth  like 
that?  The  geography  of  our  planet  has  suffered 
some  changes  in  its  long  history,  and  its  maps 
have  needed  readjustment.  But  the  map  of  the 
heavens  needs  no  revised  edition.  Now  and  then 
peradventure  some  star  scarcely  visible  at  best 
wholly  disappears  from  sight,  or  a  new  one  comes 
into  view,  but  its  heavenly  sisters  march  on  in 
changeless  procession  to  one  immutable  law.  The 
earliest  star-gazer  of  our  human  race  looked  out 
upon  exactly  the  same  constellations  and  geomet- 
rical figures  that  are  visible  to-day.  And  has  such 
a  scene  no  religious  lessons  ?  Does  anything  else 
in  the  whole  range  of  man's  experience  teach  more 
impressively  "  God's  power  and  divinity  "  ?     Is  it 


232        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

any  wonder  tliat,  as  I  gazed  that  night  and  these 
reflections  rushed  across  my  mind,  a  new  sense  of 
man's  security  under  the  beneficent  care  of  Him 
"  who  maketh  the  heavens  a  curtain  and  clotheth 
himself  with  light  as  with  a  garment "  came  over 
me,  and  a  stronger  and  more  loving  faith  took 
possession  of  my  heart !  It  was  Kepler,  the  dis- 
coverer of  those  laws  of  celestial  motion  that  are 
called  by  his  name,  who  said :  "  I  read  God's 
thoughts  after  Him."  What  was  it  that  he  read 
if  not  this,  that  the  changeless  laws  of  motion  of 
the  heavenly  bodies  are  the  evidences  written  in 
nature  itself  of  God's  changeless  love  and  bounty 
to  his  human  children? 

But  suppose  that  these  laws  of  nature,  so  stead- 
fast and  fixed  in  their  operation,  were  at  intervals 
subject  to  change  ?  Suppose  that  a  power  behind 
and  above  nature  intervened  at  any  unexpected 
and  unannounced  moment  to  work  some  miracle 
by  which  the  stars  should  be  thrown  out  of  their 
orbits,  or  the  earth  stopped  in  full  career,  or  the 
elements  of  air,  earth,  fire,  and  water  so  chemically 
changed  that  fire  should  freeze  and  water  burn,  and 
suppose  man  should  realize  how  uncertain  were  all 
the  events  and  phenomena  of  nature  around  him. 
What  would  be  the  effect  on  his  religious  feelings 
and  faith?  Would  not  his  whole  religion  be- 
come one  of  doubt  and  distrust  and  fear  ?  Would 
the  God  of  such  a  universe  be  a  God  of  love,  a 
father?  Such  were  the  actual  ideas  of  the  ancient 
world,  and  such  was  its  religion.     No  lines  were 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    233 

drawn  between  the  natural  and  the  supernatural  in 
the  philosophy  of  those  children  of  our  race.  The 
very  air  around  them  was  filled  with  supernatural 
beings,  and  their  lives  were  subject  continually 
to  their  malign  power.  In  such  an  atmosphere 
of  miracle  what  must  have  been  religious  faith? 
How  could  it  have  been  anything  else  than  one  of 
dread  and  ceaseless  anxiety !  And  such,  in  fact, 
is  the  picture  that  the  history  of  the  ancient  reli- 
gions gives  us.  Let  one  study,  if  he  wiU,  that  pic- 
ture, as  painted  by  Lucretius,  the  Latin  poet,  in 
his  poem  "  De  Rerum  Natura,"  and  let  him  also 
note  how  noble  and  worthy  was  the  poet's  aim  to 
release  the  men  of  his  time  from  the  slavery  of 
superstition  and  fear.  Lucretius  was  one  of  the 
so-called  Epicurean  skeptics  of  his  day.  But  his 
great  work  is  one  of  the  noblest  ethical  productions 
of  ancient  literature,  and  its  keynote,  anticipating 
our  modem  scientific  revival,  is  that  true  science 
is  the  firmest  basis  of  true  religion. 

There  is,  then,  no  real  conflict  between  religion 
and  science,  and  all  the  suggestions  to  this  effect 
are  simply  theological  bugbears  and  will-o-the-wisps 
to  frighten  the  ignorant  and  superstitious.  AU 
signs  of  such  a  conflict  are  disappearing  as  science 
and  history  continue  their  work,  as  are  also  so 
many  other  ghosts  of  man's  conjuring.  But  there 
is  a  conflict  stiU  going  on,  real  and  radical,  —  the 
conflict  between  science  and  the  scientific  critical 
spirit  of  this  age  and  traditional  theology ;  and  the 
result  is  as  certain  as  the  law  of  historical  evolution 


un;Vu:;>^jty 


234        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

can  make  it.  For  the  theology  tliat  the  intellec- 
tual spirit  of  this  age  demands  must  be  developed 
wholly  along  inductive  historical  lines ;  while  the 
traditional  theology  is  essentially  on  deductive  and 
metaphysical  lines ;  and  the  two  can  no  more  mix 
than  oil  and  water.  It  is,  then,  a  plain  historical 
corollary  that  the  whole  traditional  theology,  I 
mean  as  a  concatenated  system  of  religious  truth 
with  all  its  unverifiable  assumptions,  must  go  to 
the  wall.  It  goes  without  saying,  of  course,  that 
there  is  much  of  religious  truth  in  every  system 
of  human  thought.  The  lowest  forms  of  savage 
paganism  contain  some  glimmerings  of  such  truth. 
Traditional  theology  has  brought  down  through  the 
ages  and  added  continually,  as  it  has  advanced, 
many  true  conceptions  of  God  and  his  ways  with 
his  human  creatures.  Men  of  religious  genius  have 
built  on  traditional  dogmatic  foundations  works  of 
literature  that  the  world  will  not  willingly  let  die. 
Bunyan's  Pilgrim's  Progress  contains  not  a  little 
bad  theology,  but  its  treasures  of  religious  expe- 
rience will  be  a  light  stiU  for  many  a  Christian 
wayfarer.  But  the  fact  after  all  remains,  that  all 
theological  systems  that  are  built  on  a  priori  meta- 
physical and  unhistorical  foundations  are  surely 
destined  to  dusty  forgetfulness.  There  is  no  help 
for  it.  For  better  or  worse  the  age  has  made  its 
choice,  and  the  choice  must  stand.  To  the  histori- 
cal observer  who  has  emancipated  himself,  as  he 
ought  to,  from  all  dogmatic  preconceptions  and 
prejudices,  it  is  one  of  the  strangest  phenomena 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    236 

of  our  present  theological  condition  tliat  men  who 
try  to  be  clear-sighted  and  to  "  redeem  the  time  " 
yet  so  thoroughly  fail  to  see  what  is  impending. 
They  still  talk  about  a  reconstruction  of  theology 
as  if  the  major  premises  on  which  the  whole  tradi- 
tional system  is  built  were  to  remain  undisturbed, 
and  only  the  minor  premises  with  their  conclu- 
sions to  be  superficially  modified ;  whereas  it  is 
these  major  premises  which  lie  at  the  very  bottom 
of  the  structure  that  the  new  inductive  method 
insists  on  examining  and  removing.  Theologians 
of  this  class  are  still  busy  in  readjusting  the  old 
dogmatic  modes  of  syllogistic  reasoning  and  striv- 
ing to  adapt  them  to  modern  ideas,  building  new 
outworks  of  acute  speculation  on  every  side,  and 
seemingly  utterly  blind  to  the  fact  that  historical 
criticism  has  already  destroyed  the  metaphysical 
foundations  themselves  around  which  all  their 
finely  spun  works  of  reasoning  hang.  The  labor 
that  has  been  spent  on  these  mediaeval  air-castles 
is  indeed  vast.  What  immense  tomes  of  dogmatic 
theological  literature  fill  our  libraries !  It  is  in- 
deed pathetic  to  cast  the  eye  over  them  and  reflect 
how  little  that  is  vital  and  influential  remains  of 
the  mass  of  these  works  which  are  already  finding 
their  own  place  in  the  dust-heap  of  history.  It  is 
only  the  historical  scholar  who  now  thinks  of  ex- 
amining them  for  his  own  historical  ends.  To  go 
back  no  further,  who  thinks  to-day  of  reading  the 
voluminous  works  of  Jonathan  Edwards,  Samuel 
Hopkins,  or  Nathaniel  Enmions  ?     Why  are  these 


236        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

writings  no  longer  of  any  theological  value  ?  Sim- 
ply because  they  start  and  carry  with  them  all  the 
way  from  preface  to  conclusion  a  set  of  speculative 
metaphysical  assumptions  that  can  no  longer  be 
accepted  by  any  unbiased  historical  thinker.  This 
age  itself,  in  its  whole  method  of  inquiry  and  rea- 
soning, has  simply  dismissed  such  assimiptions  as 
no  longer  worthy  of  any  attention,  and  with  the  as- 
sumptions of  course  goes  all  that  is  built  on  them. 
Like  foundations,  like  building. 

But  how  about  the  books  of  our  own  time, 
freshly  issued  from  the  press,  written  from  the 
same  standpoint  ?  Take,  for  example,  one  of  the 
latest  of  them,  and,  I  will  add,  one  of  the  best, 
—  Dr.  Samuel  Harris's  "  God  the  Creator  and 
Lord  of  All."  President  George  Harris  has  re- 
cently reviewed  the  work  of  his  uncle  with  a  true 
filial  reverence,  and  yet  with  due  discrimination. 
I  have  no  doubt  that  his  avowal  of  the  convic- 
tion that  Dr.  Harris  "  was  the  greatest  theologian 
of  the  nineteenth  century "  meets  the  cordial  ap- 
proval of  many.  I  need  not  say  how  deep  is  my 
personal  respect  for  this  noble  man,  whose  por- 
trait, hanging  in  the  library  of  the  theological 
school  where  it  is  my  lot  to  teach,  so  often  meets 
my  eye.  But  it  is  not  with  Dr.  Harris  himseK, 
but  his  last  and  ablest  book  with  which  I  now 
have  to  do,  and  I  choose  it  as  perhaps  the  best 
illustration  of  the  radical  theological  position  of 
conservative  thought.  I  have  already  shown  that 
the  cardinal  difference  between  the  vanishing  old 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    237 

theology  and  the  coming  new  theology  is  that  the 
old  theology  starts  from  the  ideal  and  abstract  and 
thence  proceeds  to  the  historical  and  concrete,  in 
other  words,  from  what  is  unknown  by  experience 
to  what  is  known ;  whereas  the  new  theology  starts 
on  inductive  lines  from  the  historical  and  concrete, 
and  thence  proceeds  to  the  ideal  and  abstract  as 
far  as  valid  reasoning  may  allow,  in  other  words 
again,  from  the  known  by  experience  to  the  un- 
known. This  is  the  precise  difference  between  the 
deductive  method  which  starts  with  metaphysical 
a  'priori  assumptions  and  the  inductive  scientific 
historical  method  which  allows  no  such  assumptions 
at  the  outset,  but  starts  with  a  historical  survey  of 
all  the  facts  attainable,  and  then  considers  whether 
the  philosophical  assumptions  or  hypotheses  that 
may  be  raised  are  capable  of  being  verified  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  laws  of  history  or  of  thought. 
What  now  is  the  starting-point  of  Dr.  Harris's 
book  ?  Just  what  we  should  expect,  just  what  has 
always  been  the  starting-point  of  traditional  dog- 
matic theology.  Does  he  start  from  man  and 
nature  and  history,  in  other  words,  from  man's 
own  moral  consciousness  as  a  religious  being,  with 
his  environment  of  brother  men  and  of  nature  in 
all  its  multiform  manifestations  ?  Does  he  start 
from  what  is  nearest  and  best  known  and  then 
move  cautiously  out  towards  the  less  known  and 
thence  on  to  the  mysterious  ideal  realms  of  the 
unknown  ?  Not  so.  Dr.  Harris,  on  the  contrary, 
reverses  this  whole  inductive  process,  and  begins 


238        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

with  the  highest  and  remotest  mental  abstraction 
that  human  thought  has  ever  reached,  viz.,  the  idea 
of  God,  and  around  this  idea  of  God  he  assembles 
an  array  of  metaphysical  speculative  conceptions 
such  as  few  even  of  the  subtlest  thinkers  can 
fathom.  Let  us  examine  this  truly  wonderful 
achievement  a  little  and  get  a  few  specimens  of 
its  subtle  thought. 

Dr.  Harris  begins  by  saying  that  "the  know- 
ledge of  God  originates  in  spontaneous  belief." 
Certainly  some  knowledge  of  God  is  spontaneous 
in  man,  but  what  knowledge,  is  the  real  question. 
Dr.  Harris  proceeds  at  once  to  define  "  God." 
He  "is  the  Absolute  Spirit."  Whether  such  a 
definition  is  defensible  or  even  conceivable  we  will 
soon  consider  But,  first  of  all,  we  ask  whether 
any  such  idea  of  God  is  spontmieous  in  the  hu- 
man consciousness.  What  does  history  say  about 
it  ?  Did  the  earliest  man  rise  spontaneously  into 
any  such  height  of  mental  abstraction  and  think 
of  God  as  the  "Absolute  Spirit"?  Far  from  it. 
The  early  man  was  but  a  child,  and  "  he  thought 
as  a  child."  He  pictured  God  as  a  larger  man 
or  a  phenomenon  of  nature,  and  he  worshiped  Him 
in  all  these  forms  as  they  impressed  his  imagina- 
tion by  their  exhibitions  of  power  or  beauty.  Not 
tiU  very  late  in  human  history  did  the  thoughts 
of  men  rise  to  any  abstract  idea  of  God  such  as 
Dr.  Harris  sets  forth.  The  first  thinker  in  the 
line  of  direct  historical  succession  down  to  our- 
selves to  give  such  a  definition  of  God  was  Plato, 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    239 

and  his  "  idea  of  ideas,"  or  "  idea  of  the  good,"  the 
summum  genus  or  ultimate  abstraction  of  his  ideal 
theory  which  was  Plato's  philosophical  definition 
of  God,  is  essentially  the  definition  of  Dr.  Harris : 
"  God  is  the  Absolute  Spirit."  To  call  such  an 
abstraction,  that  can  be  understood  only  by  the 
acutest  metaphysicians,  a  "  spontaneous  belief  "  of 
men  is  surely  one  of  the  most  unhistorical  or  more 
truly  a/i^i-historical  assumptions  that  was  ever 
hazarded  by  any  theological  thinker  since  Plato 
himseK.  And  even  Plato  never  declared  such  a 
definition  "  spontaneous."  His  idealism  was  as  far 
removed  as  could  be  from  spontaneous  popular  ap- 
prehension, as  he  himself  proved  and  illustrated  in 
several  of  his  dialogues. 

It  may  be  said  in  Dr.  Harris's  defense  that  he 
was  not  dealing  with  the  historical  development 
of  the  idea  of  God,  but  only  with  its  philosophical 
implications.  Perhaps  so.  But  why  then  does  he 
talk  about  "  the  knowledge  of  God  as  originating 
in  spontaneous  belief  "  ?  What  connection  is  there 
except  by  a  long  process  of  historical  evolution 
between  the  abstract  generalization  "  God  is  the 
Absolute  Spirit "  and  God  as  spontaneously  con- 
ceived by  men  ?  But  I  am  quite  ready  to  give 
Dr.  Harris  the  benefit  of  the  doubt,  for  this  is  the 
very  point  that  I  am  seeking  to  illustrate  by  Dr. 
Harris's  own  example,  viz.,  how  little  history  has 
to  do  with  this  whole  theological  method  which 
Dr.  Harris  represents.  How  the  idea  of  God 
started  and  grew   in  human  history  seems  to  be 


240        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

no  concern  of  Dr.  Harris.  What  is  "  spontane- 
ous "  and  what  is  the  result  of  reflection  and  a 
long  speculative  evolution  is  one  and  the  same 
to  him.  Dr.  Harris  is  a  metaphysician,  not  a  his- 
torian, and  when  he  touches  historical  ground  he 
shows  at  once  his  weakness.  What  I  insist  upon 
is  that  "  spontaneous  "  is  the  last  word  in  the  dic- 
tionary to  be  applied  to  such  a  definition  of  God, 
or  to  any  definition  of  Him,  in  fact,  that  tradi- 
tional theology  has  ever  invented.  Such  definitions 
are,  one  and  all,  the  result  of  a  dogmatic  assump- 
tion unfolded  into  a  highly  metaphysical  abstract 
idea.  Let  us  examine  Dr.  Harris's  definition 
more  closely  to  see  if  this  is  not  so.  "  God  is 
the  Absolute  Spirit."  It  is  noticeable  that  Dr. 
Harris  begins  both  the  terms  "  Absolute "  and 
"  Spirit "  with  capital  letters,  by  which  he  plainly 
indicates  that  he  is  not  a  pantheist  but  a  theist 
and  holds  to  the  divine  personality.  But  if 
"  Spirit "  is  used  in  a  personal  sense,  the  question 
at  once  arises  how  can  "  Absolute  "  and  "  Spirit  " 
be  joined  together,  for  they  are  in  complete  logical 
opposition.  What  does  "  Absolute  "  mean  if  not 
what  is  unlimited  and  unconditioned?  The  Abso- 
lute is  what  is  absolved  or  released  by  its  very 
nature  from  all  hmitation,  condition,  definition ; 
it  is  the  "  Universal  of  Universals  "  of  Plato,  the 
TO  ev  or  TO  6v  of  Plotinus  and  New  Platonism,  in 
short  the  last  and  highest  generalization  of  the 
"  Tabula  Logica."  Plotinus  attempts  no  definition 
of  the  first  principle  of  Deity.     He  is  simply  the 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    241 

"  I  am,"  or  rather,  not  "  I  am,"  which  implies  per- 
sonal consciousness,  but  "  the  one  that  is,"  with- 
out positive  qualities  of  any  sort.  But  Dr.  Harris 
makes  his  "  Absolute "  a  person  with  personal 
attributes  which  he  proceeds  to  name.  But  per- 
sonality involves  hmitation  and  allows  definition. 
Personal  consciousness  rests  on  the  distinction 
between  the  Ego  and  the  non  ego,  between  the 
subjective  and  the  objective  ;  and  this  distinction 
is  the  basis  of  definition.  The  attributes  of  God 
are  the  intellectual  and  moral  powers  that  are 
exercised  in  the  realm  of  self-consciousness  and 
form  the  divine  uni-personality  over  against  the 
plurality  of  extra-divine  things.  Here  is  a  veri- 
table antinomy,  a  logical  contradiction.  To  define 
God  as  "  the  Absolute  Spirit "  is  as  much  as 
to  say  "  God  is  the  unconditioned  conditioned," 
or  "  the  unlimited  limited,"  or  "  the  impersonal 
personality."  Such  is  the  "impotent  conclusion" 
of  attempting  to  define  the  unknown  and  conse- 
quently undefinable.  And  yet  such  an  antinomy, 
in  which  the  very  laws  of  human  thought  are 
broken  down,  Dr.  Harris  would  fain  have  us  re- 
gard as  a  "  spontaneous  belief." 

But,  to  follow  Dr.  Harris  still  further,  he  goes 
on  to  declare  that  "  an  absolute  beginning  of  being 
or  power  out  of  nothing  is  impossible."  That  is, 
we  cannot  conceive  such  a  thing.  Hence  it  follows 
that  we  cannot  conceive  of  God  as  having  any  cause » 
of  his  being,  whether  outside  of  himself  or  within 
himself.    We  cannot  even  say  that  God  is  self- 


242        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

caused.  We  can  only  say  that  He  exists.  And  so 
Dr.  Harris  lays  it  down  as  a  theological  axiom : 
"  That  the  Absolute  Being  exists  is  a  self-evident 
principle  of  reason.'*  This  may  have  been  "  self- 
evident  "  to  such  a  reason  as  that  of  Dr.  Harris, 
but  I  am  sure  that  the  large  majority  of  men  would 
sadly  stumble  over  it.  Dr.  Harris  insists  that  it  is 
impossible  to  conceive  of  any  beginning  of  being  by 
any  cause  proceeding  from  the  being  who  is  sup- 
posed not  yet  to  be.  True  enough.  But  is  it  any 
easier  to  conceive  of  the  absolute  eternal  existence 
of  a  being  without  any  cause  at  all  of  his  existence 
either  without  or  within  ?  One  proposition  is  just 
as  easy  to  conceive  as  the  other,  and  to  lay  down 
either  as  "  a  self-evident  principle  of  reason  "  is  to 
beg  the  question  at  once,  and  to  fall  back  on  a 
speculative,  unsupported  assumption.  The  human 
mind  cannot  conceive  of  existence  without  a  causal 
origin.  "  Out  of  nothing  nothing  can  come  "  is  an 
axiom  as  old  as  philosophical  thought.  If  any- 
thing exists,  there  must  be  a  cause  of  its  existence 
behind  or  within  it.  If  anything  eternally  exists, 
there  must  be  an  eternal  cause  of  such  eternal 
existence.  If  God  exists  eternally.  He  must  be 
eternally  seK-caused.  Dr.  Harris  denies  this  con- 
clusion, while  accepting  the  premise,  declaring  it 
to  be  inconceivable.  He  holds  that,  if  God  is  self- 
caused,  there  must  be  a  beginning  of  his  existence 
out  of  nothing,  which  destroys  God's  eternity,  so 
that  He  is  no  longer  the  Absolute  Spirit.  I  must 
disagree  with   him   in   toto.     If   the   premise   is 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    243 

allowed,  the  conclusion,  in  my  view,  must  follow. 
But  can  the  premise  be  accepted?  This  is  the 
real  question.  Is  it  conceivable  that  God  exists 
eternally?  Here  is  another  of  those  speculative 
assumptions  for  which  there  is  no  basis  either  in 
history  or  nature  or  man's  moral  consciousness. 
What  is  meant  by  God's  eternal  existence  ?  Surely 
this :  that  there  is  no  beginning  to  it  and  no  end- 
ing, and  that  God  thus  exists  by  virtue  of  his 
own  inherent  self-existent  nature.  Now  I  venture 
to  assert  that  such  a  proposition,  though  it  can  be 
put  into  language,  cannot  be  grasped  or  even  intel- 
ligently conceived  by  the  human  mind.  It  is  easy 
to  talk  about  God's  timelessness  and  put  Him  out- 
side of  the  categories  of  time  and  space,  but  to 
conceive  God  as  thus  existing  is  impossible,  simply 
for  the  reason  that  we  are  so  hound  hy  those  cate- 
gories that  we  cannot  conceive  of  any  one  else  as 
existing  outside  of  them.  The  difficulty  lies  in  the 
very  nature  of  our  minds.  The  highest  flight  of 
imagination  has  never  carried  a  single  human  be- 
ing to  the  point  where  he  could  comprehend  God 
as  not  under  the  law  of  temporal  succession.  The 
phrase  so  frequently  used  in  theology,  "  God  lives 
in  an  eternal  Tiot/?,"  is  just  one  of  those  nonsen- 
sical expressions  by  which  the  utter  break-down 
of  intelligent  thought  has  so  often  been  concealed. 
The  human  reason  seeks,  by  a  law  of  necessity,  to 
find  behind  all  existence,  whether  mundane  or 
extra-mundane,  some  cause.  As  it  pushes  back- 
ward in  its  inquiries,  it  puts  cause  behind  cause, 


244        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

until  it  postulates  a  first  cause,  but  it  never  actu- 
ally finds  such  a  cause.  For  sucli  a  cause  must 
lie  at  the  end  of  an  infinite  series  of  causes,  and 
the  mind  can  never,  in  any  fixed  lapse  of  time, 
reach  the  end  of  such  a  series.  It  must  pause  at 
last  before  the  first  cause  is  reached.  Eternity  is 
really  a  word  that  has  and  can  have  no  meaning  to 
us.  The  speculative  theologian  may  make  a  meta- 
physical jump  and  think  he  has  compassed  it,  but 
his  supposed  scientific  definition  will  involve  an- 
other antinomy,  like  Origen's  famous  expression, 
"  eternal  generation,"  a  theological  bubble  that 
Dr.  Emmons,  to  his  credit  be  it  said,  pricked  long 
ago.  Dr.  Harris's  dogma  of  God  as  an  eternally 
existing  uncaused  Being  is  not  only  not  a  "  spon- 
taneous belief,"  it  is  one  that  the  very  laws  of  the 
mind  forbid  it  to  attempt  to  hold. 

But  I  forbear.  Enough  that  I  have  shown  how 
completely  metaphysical  Dr.  Harris's  book  is  from 
the  very  start.  It  only  needs  to  be  added  that  he 
resolutely  builds  his  whole  theology  on  these  ideal- 
istic and  speculative  foundations.  The  weakest 
part  of  the  book  is  its  christology.  Here  he  is 
obliged  to  enter  directly  the  field  of  history,  and 
his  ignorance  of  recent  historical  and  critical  in- 
vestigations is  surprisingly  revealed.  Indeed  the 
whole  book  is  a  vivid  illustration  of  the  fact  that 
historical  studies  have  made  little  real  impression 
as  yet  on  dogmatic  theologians.  There  seems  to 
be  a  fatal  incapacity  in  the  mind  that  remains 
fixed  at  the    metaphysical  standpoint  to  compre- 


DEMAND  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  SPIRIT    245 

hend  the  revolutionary  character  of  the  new  his- 
tory and  criticism.  Dr.  Harris  writes  church 
history  just  as  it  was  written  a  hundred  years  ago. 
He  still  accepts  the  Nicene  creed  and  the  Chalce- 
don  definition,  with  all  their  unhistorical  assump- 
tions. This  part  of  the  book  is  lamentably  behind 
the  times  in  its  whole  treatment  of  the  critical 
questions  that  are  concerned  with  the  literary 
origin  of  the  New  Testament  books  and  with  the 
history  of  the  evolution  of  doctrine  in  the  early 
church.  As  we  should  expect,  his  trinitarianism 
and  christology  are  wholly  traditional.  The  Sa- 
bellian  strain  that  runs  through  it  is  seen  in  the 
statement  that  "  Christ  as  Mediator  is  not  a  third 
person  between  God  and  man,"  —  a  statement  that 
is  based  on  the  monistic  modal  theory  that  there 
are  not  three  real  persons  in  the  Godhead,  but 
that  "  one  God  exists  in  three  eternal  modes  of 
being."  Of  course,  then,  Christ  could  not  be  "  a 
third  person  between  God  and  man."  One  may 
well  ask  what  element  of  mediatorship  is  left. 
Has  not  the  mediatorial  office  of  Christ  become 
a  docetic  farce  ?  Of  course  Dr.  Harris  holds  to 
Christ's  absolute  sinlessness,  for  he  holds  him  to 
be  Absolute  God.  No  wonder  Dr.  Harris  thinks 
monotheism  is  "oppressive."  Yet  he  dislikes 
pantheism.  But,  strive  as  he  may,  pantheism 
lurks  through  his  whole  philosophy.  Whether  he 
realized  it  or  not,  he  was  wearing  the  old  Augus- 
tinian-Plotinian  mask.  He  haggles  over  the  term 
"person"  in  the  same  old-fashioned  way  as  his 


246        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

predecessors  have  done  back  to  Augustine  himself. 
And  then,  having  thus  shown  himself  to  be  a 
monistic,  modalistic  unitarian  of  the  first  water, 
he  surprises  us,  if  anything  could  surprise  us  now, 
by  declaring  that  "  The  Trinity  is  the  only  worthy 
conception  of  God."  But  what  kind  of  a  Trinity  ? 
Why,  a  unitarian  trinity  of  course,  or  a  trinitarian 
unity,  just  as  one  pleases. 

If  now  it  is  asked  what  must  be  the  judgment 
of  the  historical  critic  on  this  book,  the  answer 
must  be  decided  and  emphatic.  For  this  new  age, 
with  its  new  science  and  history,  and  for  the  new 
demand  of  the  intellectual  spirit,  it  has  no  word. 
It  belongs  to  the  past,  not  to  the  present  or  future. 
I  know  not  how  it  may  seem  to  others,  but  to  me 
there  is  something  sad  in  noting  how  many  splen- 
did lives  have  been  spent  on  works  of  great  theo- 
logical erudition  and  philosophical  acuteness,  which 
by  reason  of  proceeding  from  false  assumptions  and 
along  false  lines  of  history  and  logical  reasoning, 
are  seen  to  have  become  absolutely  valueless  to  com- 
ing times.  Such  a  contemplation  reminds  one  of 
the  last  words  of  Salmasius,  one  of  the  illustrious 
scholars  of  the  seventeenth  century  :  "  Eheu^  eheu^ 
meam  vitam  perdidi  lahoriose  nihil  agendo^'' 


CHAPTER  X 

THE   NEW   THEOLOGICAL   METHOD 

Thus  we  are  brought  to  the  point  towards 
which  all  our  historical  observation  has  been  con- 
verging, that  the  old  theology  cannot  serve  us  in 
the  construction  of  the  new.  However  much  truth 
it  may  contain,  its  whole  method  of  procedure  is 
wrong.  It  starts  from  the  wrong  point  of  view ;  it 
accepts  metaphysical  assumptions  that  cannot  be 
verified  by  science  or  history ;  and,  worst  of  all,  it 
has  built  its  whole  structure  of  Christian  dogmas 
on  mythical  or  legendary  unhistorical  traditions. 
Where  then  must  the  new  theology  start  and  what 
the  course  it  must  follow,  if  it  would  satisfy  the 
demand  of  the  intellectual  spirit?  It  has  not 
been  the  purpose  of  this  historico-critical  essay  to 
attempt  even  to  lay  the  foundations  of  the  new 
theology.  The  writer  has  little  faith  in  such  an 
attempt  at  present.  The  new  intellectual  creation 
must  be,  like  the  physical  creation,  a  slow  evolu- 
tion of  time.  Theology  has  its  place,  but  it  can- 
not take  the  place  of  religious  faith  and  Hfe,  and 
there  may  be  a  very  highly  developed  condition  of 
religion,  while  a  theology  of  religion  may  still  be 
in  the  lowest  stages  of  its  formative  period.     Such 


248        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

will  be  the  fact  in  the  coining  decade,  if  one  may 
judge  from  the  present  historical  outlook.  All 
signs  point  to  a  speedy  revival  of  Christian  faith 
and  religious  life  along  the  new  line  already  in- 
dicated. Christianity  with  its  gospel  of  love 
and  •  brotherhood  and  sacrifice  is  entering  on  its 
golden  age  of  achievement  and  conquest  over  the 
hearts  of  men.  The  missionary  spirit,  starting 
from  a  new  motive,  is  to  rise  to  a  new  height 
of  evangelizing  power.  Christian  activities  in 
every  form,  which  are  already  adding  a  new 
chapter  to  political  and  social  as  well  as  religious 
history,  will  widen  still  further  their  range. 
While  the  church  is  thus  actively  engaged,  there 
can  be  little  time  for  the  development  of  a  clois- 
tered theology.  The  outlook  for  a  revival  of  the 
original  principles  and  enthusiasms  of  Christ's 
gospel  is  indeed  inspiring.  The  Christian  church 
for  ages  has  like  Hagar  been  "in  bondage  with 
her  children,"  but  that  bondage  is  at  length  broken 
and  she  goes  forth  free  and  with  the  new  power 
and  passion  that  freedom  brings.  A  new  age  of 
faith  is  already  dawning,  —  faith,  I  say,  not  in  its 
forced  dogmatic  sense,  but  in  its  true  original 
Christian  sense,  a  faith  of  the  heart  rather  than  of 
the  intellect.  "  The  future,"  wrote  Victor  Hugo, 
"belongs  even  more  to  hearts  than  to  minds." 
It  is  to  be  as  true  in  religion  as  in  other  forms  of 
life.  Mind  has  had  the  leadership  thus  far,  but 
heart  henceforth  is  to  take  the  reins.  Not  a  dead 
theological  doctrine,  but  a  living  gospel  is  to  hold 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       249 

the  field.  Neander,  the  real  founder  of  modern 
church  history,  had  more  than  a  glimpse  of  the 
truth  when  he  made  the  motto  of  his  great  work : 
"  Pectus  facit  theologum."  The  heart  is  to  lead 
even  in  theology,  and  out  of  its  experiences  and 
affirmations  the  new  theology  will  draw  some  of  its 
highest  forms  of  truth. 

The  time,  however,  is  certainly  coming  when  the 
demand  of  the  intellectual  spirit,  as  well  as  of  the 
religious  spirit,  must  be  in  some  measure  satisfied, 
and,  when  the  needful  preparations  are  finished,  the 
new  theological  edifice  will  begin  to  rise.  But  are 
the  initial  preparations  yet  complete  ?  It  cannot  be 
affirmed.  Although  the  old  orthodoxy  has  long 
been  trembling  to  its  fall,  there  still  remains  deeply 
imbedded  in  the  historical  background  of  our  age  a 
body  of  traditional  presuppositions  and  preposses- 
sions and  assumptions  that  stand  squarely  in  the  way 
of  any  radical  reconstruction ;  and  until  this  body 
of  misconceptions  is  utterly  removed,  it  is  vain  to 
talk  of  a  new  theological  movement  that  will  be 
of  any  lasting  value.  The  vital  trouble  with  the 
foundation  and  framework  of  orthodoxy  is  that 
there  is  mixed  aU  through  it,  as  a  sort  of  cement,  a 
mass  of  presuppositions  which  are  opposed  to  aU 
the  critical  results  of  science  and  of  history  and 
to  the  affirmations  of  man's  moral  consciousness. 
Such,  for  example,  are  the  assumptions  concerning 
the  supernatural  world  and  its  relations  to  this 
world ;  —  concerning  miracles  as  suspensions,  if  not 
violations,  of  the  ordinary  laws  of  nature ;  —  con- 


260        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

cerning  a  supernatural  or  miraculous  revelation  of 
God  to  man  through  specially  inspired  men ;  —  con- 
cerning the  Bible  as  a  book  of  divine  authorship 
and  hence  perfect  and  infallible  in  its  religious 
teachings  and  even  in  its  history  and  science  ;  — 
concerning  the  historicity  of  the  traditional  dates 
and  authors  of  the  books  of  Scripture ;  —  concern- 
ing the  metaphysical  being  and  character  of  God, 
and  concerning  the  account  in  Genesis  of  the  origin 
and  fall  of  man.  These  are  a  few  of  the  most  strik- 
ing presuppositions  of  orthodoxy,  and  it  can  be 
seen  at  a  glance  that  they  are  utterly  inconsistent 
with  all  the  discoveries  of  science  and  all  the  latest 
results  of  historical  scholarship.  But  it  will  be 
asked :  Are  they  not  already  discarded  by  all  intel- 
ligent evangelical  Christians  ?  By  no  means.  Take 
any  latest  theological  book,  even  of  the  most  liberal 
evangelical  sort,  and  one  will  find  one  or  more  at 
least  of  these  traditional  presuppositions,  half 
concealed,  perhaps,  but  still  assumed  throughout. 
There  is  but  one  way  of  eliminating  such  assump- 
tions, viz.,  by  a  radically  new  method  of  procedure. 
The  first  question,  then,  in  considering  how  a 
new  theology  shall  be  formed,  is  one  of  method. 
Propaedeutics  or  methodology  is  the  first  necessary 
stage  in  a  new  theological  movement.  Methodology 
has  to  do  with  the  way  in  which  matters  of  reli- 
gious truth  are  approached  and  examined.  The 
materials  of  theology  are  not  here  in  question. 
As  I  have  already  suggested,  much  material  of  the 
old  theology  will  enter  into  the  new.     Let  me  not 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       251 

be  misunderstood  on  this  point.  It  is  not  the  mor 
terial  of  the  old  theology,  but  the  way  in  which  that 
material  is  handled,  the  method  of  systemization 
employed,  and  the  unscientific  and  unhistorical 
mixture  of  true  and  false  materials,  that  render  it 
useless  for  the  new  theological  builder.  What  has 
continued  the  old  theology  so  long  in  existence  is 
the  fact  that  it  has  preserved  and  defended  so 
many  of  the  vital  truths  of  religion.  Such  are  the 
truths  of  man's  free  moral  nature  and  responsibility, 
of  sin  and  sinfulness  and  its  moral  effects,  of  man's 
capacity  for  repentance  and  a  new  spiritual  life, 
of  the  religious  sense  of  God  and  of  his  moral 
supremacy,  of  man's  instinctive  hope  of  inunortal- 
ity,  of  conscience  that  commands  to  duty  and  stirs 
the  conviction  of  moral  reward  and  punishment, 
and  of  the  revelations  of  God's  goodness  and  love 
in  nature  and  providence,  and  especially  in  the 
gospel  of  Christ.  But  while  such  truths  have  been 
held,  theological  presuppositions  and  assumptions 
have  been  put  behind  them  that  have  entirely 
changed  their  character  in  a  theological  system,  so 
that  they  have  become  repugnant  to  the  moral  con- 
sciousness and  reason,  as  well  as  inconsistent  with 
sound  historical  and  philosophical  criteria.  It  is 
not  these  great  and  essential  religious  truths  them- 
selves, but  the  way  in  which  they  have  been  shaped 
and  distorted  in  a  system,  and  mixed  with  all  sorts 
of  errors,  mythological,  legendary,  Jewish,  pagan, 
that  makes  the  old  orthodoxy,  as  a  system  of 
truth,  a  thing  to  be  rejected  and  cast  away. 


252        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

Let  me  give  an  example.  Take  the  fact  of  sin. 
History  is  full  of  illustrations  of  it.  There  can  be 
no  true  theology  in  which  sin  does  not  play  a  central 
part.  But  what  is  the  doctrine  of  sin  in  the  old 
theology  ?  It  starts  with  a  myth  that  had  floated 
down  through  primeval  tradition  and  had  become 
incorporated  into  the  Hebrew  Scriptures.  This 
myth  is  treated  as  veritable  history.  It  runs  in 
this  wise,  as  theologically  interpreted,  that  a  ser- 
pent tempts  the  first  man  and  woman  to  break  the 
commandment  of  God  by  eating  the  fruit  of  a  tree. 
This  act  of  disobedience  results  in  the  total  fall  of 
our  first  parents  into  a  moral  depravity  that  be- 
comes a  necessitated  second  nature  which  is  com- 
municated to  the  whole  human  race,  so  that  all 
men  are  by  nature  totally  depraved  and  as  moral 
beings  commit  evil,  only  evil,  and  that  continually. 
Such  is  the  tremendous  theological  result  of  the 
single  act  of  two  inexperienced  children.  This 
myth  with  all  its  absurdities  I  need  not  dwell  upon. 
But  the  old  theology  did  not  stop  with  the  myth 
itself.  It  added  a  figment  of  Greek  philosophy. 
Plato  had  made  universal  ideas  the  true  realities, 
and  individual  phenomena  only  concrete  expres- 
sions of  such  realities.  Augustine  applied  the 
Platonic  idealism  to  his  doctrine  of  sin.  When 
Adam  sinned,  it  was  not  merely  Adam  the  indi- 
vidual, but  the  universal  in  Adam,  that  is,  human 
nature,  that  sinned ;  consequently  when  Adam 
sinned  aU  his  descendants  sinned  in  him  and  fell 
with  him.     Therefore,  on  metaphysical  as  well  as 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       263 

supposed  historical  grounds,  it  is  held  that  the 
whole  human  race,  without  a  single  exception,  is 
sinful,  guilty,  and  punishable  eternally.  Note  that 
this  terrible  dogma  of  "  original  sin "  which  has 
hung  like  a  nightmare  over  the  Christian  faith  of 
these  long  centuries  is  the  simple  result  of  the  dis- 
tortion of  the  truth  about  sin  by  means  of  the  fal- 
sifying of  history  and  the  introduction  of  a  piece 
of  purely  speculative  philosophy.  Is  it  any  wonder 
that  all  men  of  intelligence  to-day  reject  it  with 
scorn? 

I  am  tempted  to  illustrate  this  point  by  another 
example,  —  the  old  theological  dogma  of  Hell, 
This  dogma,  which  held  so  large  a  place  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  as  is  witnessed  by  the  paintings  on 
the  walls  of  churches  and  by  the  great  poem  of 
Dante,  had  its  birth  in  the  religious,  materialistic 
imaginations  of  barbarous  and  pre-Christian  peo- 
ples. The  realistic  descriptions  of  the  "  Inferno  " 
and  of  "  Paradise  Lost "  are  anticipated  and  ri- 
valed by  those  in  Plutarch,  and  Plato,  and  Jose- 
phus.  The  Jews  obtained  their  doctrine  apparently 
from  the  Persians.  Christ's  references  to  it  are 
few  and  apocalyptic,  and  simply  reflect  the  Jewish 
faith  of  his  day.  One  of  the  saddest  effects  of  this 
dogma  of  a  place  of  material  suffering,  in  which 
fire  was  made  the  chief  instrument,  was  the  prac- 
tice of  burning  heretics  which  formed  such  a  hor- 
rible chapter  in  the  history  of  Christianity.  How 
a  dogma  that  gives  such  stimulus  to  the  develop- 
ment of  the  most  cruel  sentiments  of  human  nature 


254        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

could  have  been  retained  so  long  in  Christian  the- 
ology can  only  be  accounted  for  by  the  tenacity 
with  which  the  dogma  of  the  plenary  inspiration  of 
the  Bible  has  been  held.  Strange  to  say  it  has  not 
yet  wholly  passed  out  of  Christian  belief.  That  sin 
will  find  in  some  way  its  punishment  is  surely  a 
truth  of  revelation  in  many  forms,  but  the  old 
dogma  of  a  local,  material  Hell  as  a  place  of  tor- 
ment of  the  bodies  and  souls  of  men  is  as  surely  a 
relic  of  pagan  superstition  as  it  is  contradicted  by 
all  science  and  history.  The  Copernican  theory 
gave  it  its  real  death-blow.  There  is  no  hell  save 
in  the  sinner's  own  remorseful  soul.  Such  was  the 
truth  put  by  Milton  into  the  lips  of  Satan :  — 

"  Me  miserable  !     Which  way  shall  I  fly 
Infinite  wrath  and  infinite  despair  ? 
Which  way  I  fly  is  hell ;  myself  am  hdl" 

If  any  one  doubts  whether  this  dogma  still  lives  in 
the  old  theology,  let  him  consult  Dr.  A.  A.  Hodge's 
"  Outlines  of  Theology,"  in  which  it  is  declared  that 
"  the  material  body  of  Christ  rose  from  the  dead," 
and  that  "  our  resurrection  is  to  be  because  of  and 
like  to  that  of  Christ,  which  was  of  his  identical 
body."  On  this  assumption  is  based  the  further 
doctrine  of  a  definite,  local,  material  heaven  and 
heU,  and  of  a  material  punishment,  involving  "  the 
punitive  infliction  of  torment,  —  God's  wrath  de- 
scending upon  both  the  moral  and  physical  nature 
of  its  objects."  How,  after  aU  this,  Dr.  Hodge 
should  hold  that  "  the  terms  used  in  scripture  to 
describe  these  sufferings  are  evidently  figurative  " 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       256 

is  surely  surprising.  I  would  also  refer  the  reader 
to  Dr.  Shedd,  who  in  his  "Dogmatic  Theology" 
devotes  two  pages  to  "  Heaven "  and  about  fifty 
pages  to  "  Hell,"  showing  at  least  the  deep  interest 
he  took  in  the  subject.  He  defends  at  length  the 
traditional  view  and  bases  it  on  Christ's  own  teach- 
ing, whom  he  makes  "  responsible  for  the  doctrine 
of  Eternal  Perdition,"  and  whom  he  calls  "  that 
omniscient  Being  who  made  the  statements  respect- 
ing the  day  of  judgment  and  the  final  sentence." 
Plainly  Dr.  Shedd  remained  wholly  unaffected  by 
the  new  history  and  criticism.  But  if  he  was  ig- 
norant of  modern  science,  he  was  certainly  learned 
in  the  old  traditionalism.  His  acquaintance  with 
"Hell "  is  as  direct  and  personal  as  that  of  Ulysses 
or  -^neas.  He  knows  not  only  where  it  is,  but 
also  the  exact  condition  of  its  lost  inhabitants. 
"  Hell  is  only  a  comer  of  the  universe.  The  Gothic 
etymon  (Hohle,  Holle)  denotes  a  covered-up  hole. 
It  is  bottomless  but  not  boundless."  And,  as  to 
its  inhabitants,  "there  is  not  a  single  throb  of 
godly  sorrow,  or  a  single  pulsation  of  holy  desire  in 
the  lost  spirit."  How  has  Dr.  Shedd  learned  all 
this  ?  one  may  well  ask.  Certainly  Christ  pictures 
Dives  in  Hades  as  having  some  "  pulsation  of  holy 
desire,"  since  he  begged  Abraham  to  send  Lazarus 
to  his  brethren,  "  lest  they  also  come  into  this  place 
of  torment."  Surely  here  is  an  altruistic  state  of 
moral  feeling  that  is  far  removed  from  Dr.  Shedd's 
description  of  lost  souls.  Would  Christ  have 
spoken  such  a  parable  had  he  regarded  such  souls 


256        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

as  lost  to  all  right  moral  emotion  or  desire  ?  If 
Dr.  Shedd  held  Christ  to  be  "omniscient"  and 
"responsible"  for  the  orthodox  eschatology,  why- 
was  not  his  testimony  accepted  on  so  vital  a  ques- 
tion as  the  moral  state  of  souls  who  leave  this 
world  impenitent !  The  truth  is  that  we  here 
touch  one  of  those  metaphysical  assumptions  that 
underlie  Dr.  Shedd's  whole  theology. 

These  illustrations  are  enough  to  show  that  the 
rejection  of  such  dogmas  of  the  old  theology  is  a 
very  different  thing  from  rejecting  the  truth  itself 
concerning  sin  and  its  consequences.  It  has  been 
the  task  of  historical  criticism,  as  we  have  seen,  to 
clear  up  the  confusion  that  has  so  long  existed  of 
religious  truth  with  its  dogmatic  disfigurements. 
Theology  has  so  long  masqueraded  as  the  very 
"  holy  of  holies  "  of  truth  itself  that  men  have  for- 
gotten that  it  is  only  a  sartorial  dressing  up  of  it. 
What  is  a  theological  system?  Only  the  philo- 
sophical or  theological  way  in  which  some  man 
looks  at  truth.  So  we  have  Calvin's  theology,  or 
that  of  Edwards  or  that  of  Emmons.  The  number 
of  theologies  is  legion.  But  truth  we  know  is  one, 
though  the  forms  or  aspects  of  it  may  be  as  numer- 
ous as  are  the  observers.  Here  lies  the  great 
benefit  of  free  theological  inquiry,  that  it  allows 
truth  to  be  studied  on  every  side,  so  that  all  its  in- 
finitely various  aspects  may  be  brought  more  clearly 
to  view  and  become  the  common  property  of  all. 
The  more  theological  systems  the  better  for  our 
knowledge  of  truth  if  they  are  made  undogmatic 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       257 

and  free,  just  as  the  more  telescopes  there  are 
raised  to  the  skies,  the  better  for  oiir  knowledge  of 
astronomy.  Theology  is  simply  a  science  among 
sciences.  It  is  a  science  of  religion,  as  astronomy 
is  a  science  of  the  physical  heavens.  Scientists 
may  make  mistakes,  by  means  of  wrong  observa- 
tions or  hypotheses.  The  Ptolemaic  astronomy  as 
a  system  is  false,  because  based  on  a  wrong  hypo- 
thesis. The  Copernican  is  true  for  the  reverse 
reason.  So  there  are  false  and  true  theologies  or 
philosophies  of  religious  truth,  as  a  result  of  th^ 
different  philosophical  or  historical  assumptions 
that  lie  behind  them.  But  the  truths  of  astronomy 
and  of  religion  do  not  stand  or  fall  with  any  man's 
science  or  philosophy.  A  man  may  hold  the  truth 
as  it  is  in  Jesus  and  yet  reject  half  of  the  theolo- 
gies extant,  yea  all  of  them ;  for  truth  is  independ- 
ent of  all  theological  form,  as  a  rose  blooms  and 
sweetens  the  air  regardless  of  botany.  It  is  the 
arrant  dogmatism  of  the  old  theology  that  has  dis- 
credited it  utterly  with  this  scientific  age.  It  has 
not  only  claimed  to  be  the  whole  and  the  only 
truth,  but  has  also  set  itself  up  as  the  sovereign 
arbiter  of  all  questions  concerning  truth  in  its 
every  form.  The  theologians  of  this  school  make 
theology  the  fountain  head  of  every  other  science, 
"  scientia  scientiarum^"  in  the  sense  that  all  other 
sciences  are  to  be  determined  in  their  principles 
and  results  by  the  dicta  of  theology,  that  is  to  say, 
of  these  same  theologians.  This  assumption  forms 
the  yery  varp  and  wppf  of  tihe  old  theology^  and 


268         EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

yet  it  seems  so  preposterous  to  our  modern  ears 
that  it  can  scarcely  be  believed  that  one  should  be 
found  to  squarely  avow  it.  But  the  old  theology 
stiU  boasts  of  stout  defenders,  and  certainly  Presi- 
dent Hartranft  of  Hartford  Theological  Seminary 
may  be  reckoned  among  the  stoutest  of  them.  His 
inaugural  address  delivered  only  a  decade  ago  was 
a  sort  of  theological  ultimatum^  and  displayed  the 
defiant  air  of  a  man  who  has  put  his  back  against 
the  wall.  It  is  an  indictment  of  all  sciences  in 
their  claim  of  independence  and  equahty  with  the- 
ological science.  His  main  proposition  is  "that 
theology  is  the  absolute  head  of  aU  sciences,"  "the 
starting-point  and  goal  of  all  genuine  knowledge 
as  a  whole,  and  of  all  classified  knowledges."  This 
proposition  is  made  to  rest  on  the  major  premise 
from  which  everything  starts,  viz. :  "  The  absolute 
supremacy  of  Christ's  views  of  God  and  the  uni- 
verse, man  and  the  world."  Of  course  behind  this 
premise  lies  the  implicit  assumption  that  Christ  is 
the  Absolute  God,  in  the  full  exercise  of  the  divine 
omniscience,  in  virtue  of  which  his  utterances  on 
every  question,  not  only  of  religion  but  also  of  his- 
tory, science,  politics,  philosophy,  art,  literature, 
are  absolutely  true  and  therefore  of  supreme  au- 
thority. This  involves  the  corollary  that  Christ's 
church,  which  is  the  repository  of  his  truth,  "  must 
have  her  own  canons  of  art,  literature,  philosophy, 
science,  based  on  her  Lord's  supreme  doctrine  and 
ethics."  Thus  the  dogmatic  foundations  are  laid 
for  his  indictment  against  modern  science  and  phi- 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       259 

losophy  which  is  that  "all  divisions  of  human 
learning,"  instead  of  remaining  as  "branches  of 
theology,"  have  become  "  estranged  and  independ- 
ent," and  so  "have  become  helpful  to  doubt  and 
darkness  and  have  made  themselves  aliens  from 
the  commonwealth  of  which  they  ought  to  be  the 
worthiest  citizens."  And  then  follows  a  diatribe 
against  this  anti-Christian  position  of  the  sciences 
and  also  against  "  the  greater  body  of  the  church 
to-day  "  who  are  "  meekly  acquiescing  "  in  it,  clos- 
ing with  the  remarkable  declaration  that  the  effort 
to  "reconcile  science  and  religion  "  is  "  all  bosh  and 
very  unmanly  bosh  at  that."  And  why  "  aU  bosh  "  ? 
Because  there  is  no  such  thing  as  science  apart 
from  religion,  that  is  theology,  since  "all  the 
knowledges  are  theology,  not  science,  not  ethics, 
but  theology,  sublime,  tranquil,  eternal."  And 
what  does  all  this  rodomontade  mean,  when  we 
get  down  from  the  sublimities  and  tranquillities, 
etc.,  to  plain  English  ?  Just  this,  that  for  aU  our 
history  and  science  and  methods  of  scientific  his- 
torical criticism  we  must  go  to  the  Bible.  Christ 
exercises  "  absolute  supremacy  "  in  this  whole  busi- 
ness. He  indorsed  the  Old  Testament,  therefore 
its  myths  and  legends  are  real  history,  and  are  to 
be  accepted  as  such  by  all  Christian  scholars. 
Therefore  Moses  is  to  be  accepted  as  the  author  of 
the  Pentateuch,  whether  he  really  wrote  it  or  not. 
Did  not  Christ  plainly  speak  of  him  as  the  author? 
Therefore  the  parable  of  Jonah  and  the  big  fish  is 
to  be  accepted  as  a  historical  narrative  of  what 


260        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITAKIANISM 

really  occurred.  Did  not  Christ  speak  of  Jonah 
as  being  three  days  in  the  whale's  belly?  Of 
course  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis  is  good  geology, 
and  the  world  was  created  in  just  six  days,  and  the 
sun  standing  still  at  Joshua's  command  is  good 
astronomy  at  least  for  that  day  when  the  command 
was  uttered.  I  am  not  doing  Dr.  H^ranft  any 
injustice.  What  else  does  he  mean  by  asking: 
"  Is  not  the  scientist's  view  of  the  imiverse  deemed 
of  higher  moment  than  Christ's  view?"  Of  course 
Dr.  Hartranft  here  means  that  in  his  view  Christ 
was  a  perfect  scientist  and  that  his  gospel  should 
be  accepted  as  the  scientific  grammar  and  text- 
book of  all  Christian  scientists.  So  of  "  chemistry, 
geology,  astronomy."  What  is  the  matter  with 
our  geology  according  to  Dr.  Hartranft  ?  Plainly 
the  fact  that  it  does  not  tie  itself  to  the  first  chap- 
ter of  Genesis.  Of  course  there  is  no  arguing  with 
such  a  position ;  for  there  is  no  common  ground 
on  which  the  disputants  can  stand.  All  these 
amazing  theological  assumptions  historical  criticism 
dismisses  at  once  as  unworthy  of  the  slightest  at- 
tention. They  belong  to  a  method  that  has  "  had 
its  day  and  ceased  to  be  "  to  aU  true  scholars. 
The  intellectual  spirit  of  the  age  utters  its  demand 
in  vain  in  the  presence  of  such  dogmatic  pessimism, 
and  passes  it  contemptuously  by,  regarding  it  with 
a  curiosity  such  as  a  scientist  feels  toward  some 
specimen  of  an  extinct  species,  fit  only  to  be  classi- 
fied for  its  proper  place  in  a  museum  of  antiquities. 
Ilnough  surely  has  been  said  in  illustration  of 


THE  NEW  THEOLOGICAL  METHOD       261 

the  false  method  of  the  old  theology  and  its 
underlying  metaphysical  assumptions.  But  there 
is  one  assumption  which  has  a  place  by  itself,  and 
perhaps  should  be  specially  considered,  because  it 
claims  to  rest  on  historical  grounds  that  cannot 
be  impeached.  I  refer  to  the  argument  so  often 
pressed  triumphantly  in  proof  of  the  traditional 
miraculous  origin  of  Christianity  and  its  dogmas, 
viz.,  that  its  very  history  shows  it.  The  trouble 
with  this  argument  is  that  it  proves  too  much. 
Not  everything  that  outlives  persecution  and  the 
mightiest  efforts  of  human  powers  is  therefore 
divine  and  morally  perfect.  The  counsel  of  Gama- 
liel in  the  Jewish  Sanhedrim,  based  on  the  theory 
that  "if  this  work  be  of  men  it  will  be  over- 
thrown, but  if  it  is  of  God  ye  will  not  be  able 
to  overthrow  them,"  no  doubt  was  discreet  and 
wise,  but  the  theory  behind  it  has  had  a  very 
imperfect  realization  in  history.  Other  religions 
beside  the  Christian  have  survived  every  effort  to 
destroy  them,  and  have  rivaled  Christianity  itself 
in  their  long  and  wonderful  hold  on  the  faith  of 
men ;  for  example,  Buddhism  and  Mohammedan- 
ism. The  Roman  Papacy  uses  the  same  argument 
in  support  of  its  claims.  No  other  institution  in 
history  has  such  historic  ground  on  which  to  stand. 
Slavery  might  be  defended  in  the  same  way.  The 
truth  is,  Christianity  has  lived  and  evolved  itself 
by  the  same  historic  laws  as  other  religions  and 
religious  institutions  and  beliefs.  The  old  the- 
ology, in  pressing  this  point,  has  shown  the  same 


262        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

lack  of  historical  insight  and  perspective  that  has 
characterized  it  everywhere.  It  has  idealized 
Christian  history,  as  if  the  church  were  a  sort  of 
heaven  on  earth ;  whereas,  in  fact,  Christendom 
has  never  been  free  from  the  corruptions  and 
wickednesses  and  awful  crimes  that  beset  our  poor 
humanity  everywhere  and  always.  The  time  has 
gone  by  for  such  idealized  pictures  of  Christian 
history  as  the  old  historians  used  to  paint.  The 
great  oecumenical  councils  that  formulated  the  old 
theology  were  the  scene  of  imchristian  antagonisms, 
and  bitter  strife  and  fightings  that  were  never 
rivaled  in  the  history  of  any  other  religion,  and 
no  religion  of  which  history  has  a  record  was  ever 
guilty  of  such  cruel  persecutions  as  Christianity, 
whose  founder  was  the  meek  and  lowly  Jesus  of 
Nazareth.  Whether  the  Christian  religion  is  a 
religion  from  God,  in  a  sense  in  which  no  other 
religion  is,  or  not,  the  history  of  its  so-called  dis- 
ciples, from  the  fourth  century  down  to  recent 
times,  has  been  one  to  make  men  often  blush,  and 
the  story  of  many  of  the  practical  fruits  of  the  old 
theology  is  one  of  the  saddest  chapters  in  human 
annals.  I  submit,  then,  that  this  assumption  must 
go  with  the  rest. 

So  much  for  the  question  of  metkod  and  the 
reasons  growing  out  of  it  for  the  rejection  of  the 
old  theology  as  a  basis  for  the  construction  of 
the  new.  The  next  question  is  that  of  material. 
From  what  materials  shall  the  new  theology  be 
constructed  ? 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  MATEEIALS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY 

Evert  science  has  its  material  to  work  upon,  its 
own  field  of  operation  in  which  its  scientific  prin- 
ciples and  laws  can  be  freely  and  independently 
exercised.  So  theology  as  a  science  has  its  own 
materials  and  field  of  working.  And  if  theology 
be,  as  it  surely  is,  the  philosophical  account  which 
religion  and  the  religious  sphere  gives  of  itself,  then 
the  materials  of  the  new  theology  must  be  derived 
from  that  sphere.  What  then  in  the  sphere  of 
religion  and  religious  experience  are  the  sources 
or  media  of  religious  truth  in  the  various  forms 
of  divine  revelation  ?  The  answer  of  course  must 
be  determined  by  the  new  inductive  method,  and 
hence  we  must  dismiss  at  once  the  old  theological 
assumption  that  a  miraculous  revelation  was  com- 
municated directly  by  God  to  a  few  specially  in- 
spired prophets,  and  by  them,  or  by  others  inspired 
like  them,  incorporated  in  a  book ;  for  there  is  no 
valid  evidence  of  such  a  divine  procedure,  and  it 
is,  moreover,  in  violation  of  all  God's  other  methods 
of  communicating  with  men.  Religious  truth  can 
come  to  the  soul  only  through  its  own  laws  and 
faculties  of  receiving  knowledge,  and  hence  man's 


264        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

own  moral  consciousness  is  the  only  direct  and  ulti- 
mate avenue  of  moral  light  and  inspiration  from 
God. 

But  the  divine  providence  employs  other  media 
through  which  to  reveal  itself  indirectly.  One 
such  medium  is  nature  in  all  its  material  forms. 
Of  nature  or  science  as  a  religious  teacher  I  have 
already  spoken,  and  need  only  to  add  here  that 
too  little  has  hitherto  been  made  of  this  source  of 
religious  truth.  The  prejudice  raised  by  the  old 
theology  against  aU  natural  science  has  prevented 
its  light  from  clearly  shining  upon  many  religious 
minds.  It  is  certainly  remarkable  how  little  ap- 
preciation theological  writers  of  the  old  school 
have  had  of  the  rehgious  aspects  of  nature.  John 
Calvin  lived  iii  Geneva  surrounded  by  some  of  the 
grandest  and  most  beautiful  scenery  in  Europe. 
Mt.  Blanc  was  in  full  view  from  his  windows ; 
yet  there  is  not  a  single  allusion,  so  far  as  I  know, 
to  those  "  wonderful  works  of  God "  in  all  his 
voluminous  writings.  To  him  this  world  was 
simply  a  place  to  stay  in,  not  a  temple  illumined 
with  the  Shekinah  of  God's  presence.  But  as  this 
theological  prejudice  disappears  and  gives  place  to 
right  views,  the  religious  revelations  of  nature  will 
grow  more  and  more  luminous.  Already  our 
noblest  forms  of  literature  are  being  inspired  by 
these  revelations.  Modern  poetry  siace  Words- 
worth has  been  pervaded  with  a  deep  sense  of  the 
divine  presence  in  natural  scenes.  One  cannot 
walk  over  the  Lake  district,  where  Wordsworth 


THE  MATERIALS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    265 

lived  so  many  years,  without  realizing  how  close 
was  his  sympathy  with  Nature  in  all  her  moods, 
and  how  full  of  the  elements  of  religious  thought 
and  feeling  were  the  fountains  around  him  from 
which  he  drew.  If  one  has  never  withdrawn  him- 
seK  from  the  haunts  of  men,  for  a  considerable 
period,  into  the  retirement  of  mountains  and  for- 
ests, he  knows  little  of  the  real  companionship  with 
God  that  may  be  enjoyed  in  such  solitudes,  where 
nature  speaks  to  man  face  to  face. 

Another  medium  of  divine  revelation  is  history^ 
or  the  record  of  human  events  and  lives.  Through 
history  man  is  helped  to  read  himself  and  his 
religious  relations  and  duties  in  the  lives  and  con- 
duct of  his  fellow  men.  The  history  of  the  human 
race  becomes  as  if  an  enlarged  moral  conscious- 
ness in  which,  as  in  a  glass,  every  faculty  and 
aspect  of  man's  moral  life  is  displayed  in  every 
possible  form  of  human  working  and  development. 
Hence  history  has  a  vital  religious  function, — 
one  that  has  hitherto  been  sadly  neglected.  Na- 
ture and  history  together,  embracing  everything 
outside  of  man's  own  subjective  moral  conscious- 
ness, are  the  two  great  avenues  of  the  revelation  of 
God  himself,  —  that  infinite  and  unknown  being 
"  whom  no  man  hath  seen  or  can  see."  But  there 
is  one  unique  illustration  of  moral  consciousness 
in  history  that  bespeaks  our  special  attention.  I 
mean  that  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  being  the  loftiest 
and  divinest  form  of  such  consciousness  that  has 
yet  been  seen  among  men.     I  have  already  dwelt 


266        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

upon  it  in  the  chapter  on  the  demand  of  the  reli- 
gious spirit.  But  we  now  approach  it  from  the 
intellectual  rather  than  religious  side,  inquiring  as 
to  the  degree  and  character  of  the  religious  light 
shed  by  the  moral  consciousness  of  Christ  on  our 
own  paths  in  life,  not  only  as  religious  but  also 
as  intellectual  beings.  We  ask  ourselves,  then,  as 
to  the  qualifications  of  Christ  to  be  a  teacher  of 
moral  truth.  The  basis  of  such  qualifications 
must  have  been  the  peculiar  character  of  his  own 
moral  consciousness.  It  may  be  asked  what  I 
mean  by  Christ's  moral  consciousness.  I  mean 
that  faculty  of  his  moral  nature  through  which  he 
realized  God's  personal  fatherhood  and  relation- 
ship, and  also  that  moral  kingdom  of  which  God 
is  the  head-spring.  It  was  this  consciousness  that 
gave  Christ  the  two  cardinal  foci  of  his  gospel,  — 
divine  sonship  and  human  brotherhood. 

Now  as  to  Christ's  moral  consciousness,  the  first 
thing  to  be  noted  is  that  it  was  a  completely  hu- 
man one.  Bom  in  the  natural  line  of  a  human 
genealogy,  Christ  had  a  complete  human  nature. 
Such  a  nature  involved  a  complete  human  con- 
sciousness, one,  I  mean,  whoUy  like  that  of  all 
other  men.  There  is  nothing  in  the  three  Synoptic 
gospels,  which  give  us  the  earliest  and  least  ideal- 
ized picture  of  Christ,  to  indicate  that  he  ever 
rose  into  any  form  of  religious  consciousness  that 
was  superhuman  or  unnatural.  Everywhere  and 
always  he  was  a  man  speaking  to  brother  men. 
In  his  highest  and  sublimest  flights  of  thought  he 


THE  MATERIALS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    267 

never  lost  sight  of  his  real  humanity.  He  is  ever 
the  same  simple,  unpretending,  meek  and  lowly 
Jesus  of  Nazareth,  the  son  of  Joseph  and  Mary, 
with  brothers  and  sisters  who  are  continually  mov- 
ing in  and  out  of  the  circle  of  his  daily  life. 

But,  secondly^  it  is  clear  that  Christ's  conscious- 
ness was  eminent  in  its  whole  religious  movement 
above  all  who  were  around  him.  Hence  it  was 
that  he  spoke  with  a  new  kind  of  moral  authority. 
"  No  man  ever  spoke  like  this  man."  So  like 
others  was  he  and  yet  so  unlike.  Naturally  and 
humanly  like,  morally  and  religiously  unlike.  The 
difference  was  not  in  kind  but  in  degree.  His 
religious  consciousness  not  only  rose  higher,  but 
began  to  develop  itseK  earlier  than  that  of  other 
men.  What  is  most  remarkable  in  his  conversa- 
tion with  the  rabbis  at  twelve  years  of  age  is  not 
the  fact  that  his  questions  and  answers  were  so 
wonderful  in  themselves,  as  that  his  mind  was  occu- 
pied with  them  so  early.  That  a  child  of  twelve 
should  be  able  to  meet  rabbis  of  mature  years  on 
equal  footing  was  indeed  a  marvel  of  religious 
precocity. 

There  is  a  third  feature  of  Christ's  moral  con- 
sciousness that  is  perhaps  the  most  wonderful  of 
all,  —  the  clear  and  steady  sense  he  had  from 
first  to  last  of  its  limitations.  That  Christ  should 
have  confined  his  teaching  so  closely  to  purely 
religious  themes  grows  the  more  remarkable  the 
more  one  considers  it.  What  temptations  beset 
him,  as  beset  all  teachers,  to  include  in  his  com- 


268        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

munications  other  subjects  of  thought  and  inter- 
est ?  But  what  a  wonderful  reserve  characterized 
him,  even  when  questions  put  to  him  seemed  to 
be  providential  opportunities  to  enlarge  his  sphere 
of  instruction  !  Yet  never  once  did  he  yield  to 
such  temptations.  He  never  set  himself  up  as  a 
philosophic  theologian,  or  scientist,  or  critic,  or 
politician,  or  historian.  "  My  kingdom  is  not  of 
this  world,"  he  said,  when  men  sought  to  learn 
something  of  his  views  on  purely  temporal  and 
earthly  things.  His  sphere  was  moral  and  reli- 
gious, the  sphere  of  his  own  religious  conscious- 
ness, "  the  kingdom  of  God  within  "  him.  It  is 
indeed  amazing  that  men  like  President  Hartranft 
can  make  Christ  "absolutely  supreme"  in  the 
whole  realm  of  knowledge,  when  he  so  carefully 
guarded  himself  against  all  danger  of  such  an 
interpretation  of  his  mission  among  men.  What 
shred  of  science  or  history  or  philosophy  or  art 
can  be  found  in  any  of  his  words  ?  He  professed 
only  to  be,  just  what  he  was,  a  plain  unlettered 
Galilean  peasant,  learned  only  in  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures of  his  own  Jewish  people,  and  using  these 
Scriptures  only  to  enforce  and  illustrate  the  reli- 
gious intuitions  that  absorbed  his  soul.  What 
stronger  proof  can  be  found  of  what  surely  needs 
no  proof,  that  Christ  was  our  true  fellow  man, 
than  the  steadiness  with  which  he  kept  himself 
within  the  limitations  of  his  human  nature  and 
historical  surroundings  ?  In  all  matters  of  earthly 
science  and  learning  Christ  was  no  authority,  and 


THE  MATERIALS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    269 

never  claimed  to  be.  Only  in  the  region  of  man's 
moral  nature  did  lie  speak  "  as  one  having  author- 
ity, and  not  as  the  scribes."  But  in  that  realm 
his  words  come  with  the  same  authority  to-day, 
because  they  were  spoken  out  of  a  consciousness 
of  intimate  relationship  with  God  and  his  kingdom 
of  moral  truth  that  is  still  unrivaled,  in  its  hea- 
venly intuitions,  among  men. 

It  will  be  asked,  Is  the  Bible  not  to  be  reckoned 
among  the  media  of  divine  revelation  ?  Certainly ; 
but  not  in  the  way  in  which  the  old  theology  would 
reckon  it.  Its  presuppositions  of  a  divine  miracu- 
lous origin  and  character,  differentiating  the  Bible 
from  all  other  religious  literature,  can  no  longer 
be  admitted.  Historically  considered,  the  Bible 
is  simply  a  literary  product  of  the  Hebrew  and 
Jewish  nation.  Yet  its  place  in  religious  Hterature 
is  unique,  and  in  the  New  Testament  especially 
we  have  those  precious  sayings  and  biographical 
notices  of  Christ  which  place  it  above  all  similar 
productions.  The  Bible  thus  becomes  a  very  im- 
portant part  of  history  as  an  interpreter  of  the 
moral  consciousness  of  the  race.  The  accounts  of 
Abraham,  Moses,  David,  Elijah,  Paul,  and  Jesus 
himself,  and  the  history  of  the  whole  Jewish  peo- 
ple, furnish  a  chapter  in  the  universal  history  of 
mankind  that  could  not  be  omitted  without  irre- 
parable loss  to  the  world.  It  is  the  high  form 
of  religious  consciousness  manifesting  itself  in  the 
whole  Bible,  as  in  Christ,  that  gives  it  such  a 
unique  place  in  religious  history.     It  is  worthless 


270        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

indeed  for  purposes  of  science  or  even  of  philo- 
sophy, but  it  remains  still  the  Book  of  books  for 
religious  faith  and  devotion,  and  is  thus  preemi- 
nently essential  as  a  medium  of  God's  revelation 
of  himself  to  man. 

It  may  be  expected  that  the  Churchy  as  a  re- 
ligious institution,  should  be  included  in  this  ac- 
count of  the  materials  of  the  new  theology.  The 
Church,  as  an  expression  for  the  united  people  of 
God,  has  already  been  described  under  the  term 
"  history  " ;  but  as  to  the  Church,  in  the  sense  of  a 
corporation  claiming  to  be  the  recipient  of  author- 
ity from  Christ  to  lord  it  over  the  religious  faith 
and  doctrines  of  men,  as  is  claimed  by  the  Papal 
Church  or  by  High  Church  Protestants  of  any 
kind,  the  inductive  historical  method  knows  no- 
thing of  it,  and  gives  it  no  special  place  in  the 
media  of  revelation.  Christ's  kingdom  of  the 
truth  is  not  an  outward  institution  of  any  kind, 
but  "  is  within,"  in  the  religious  consciousness  of 
aU  godly  souls. 


CHAPTER  Xn 

THE   CONSTRUCTION   OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY 

The  method  of  the  new  theology  and  the  ma- 
terials out  of  which  it  is  to  be  constructed  having 
been  determined,  the  ground  is  clear  for  the  con- 
struction itself.  The  path  thus  opened  is  truly 
alluring  to  any  constructive  thinker.  But  such  a 
theological  evolution  is  not  within  the  purpose  and 
plan  of  this  historical  essay.  It  is  possible  only 
to  break  ground  a  little  in  this  direction,  and  that, 
not  by  any  effort  to  build  up  a  theological  system, 
for  which,  as  I  have  before  indicated,  the  time  is 
not  yet  ripe,  but  merely  by  way  of  hints  and  illus- 
trations of  the  method  of  procedure  with  the  ma- 
terials in  hand.  And  in  doing  this  I  shall  confine 
myself  to  the  special  subject  of  which  this  book 
is  a  history,  viz.,  the  doctrine  of  God  and  of  the 
revelation  of  Him  as  made  in  Jesus  Christ. 

The  doctrine  of  God  has  become  so  completely 
metaphysical  and  speculative  throughout  the  whole 
history  of  Christianity  that  it  is  exceedingly  diffi- 
cult to  treat  it  inductively  without  disturbing  con- 
siderably traditional  ideas.  The  old  definitions  of 
God  have  been  made  and  accepted  as  if  He  were 
as  well  known  as  the  most  conspicuous  character 


272        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

of  history.  The  process,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a 
curious  or.e.  Philosophy  slowly  reached  the  con- 
ception of  the  most  abstract  universal  idea  that 
logical  laws  could  evolve.  This  ultimate  abstrac- 
tion, unlimited  and  indefinable,  was  then  made 
synonymous  with  God.  But  God,  to  be  an  object 
of  religious  belief  and  trust,  must  be  a  person. 
So  the  abstract  God  was  turned  into  a  concrete 
God,  with  personal  attributes  and  definitions. 
And  it  is  this  philosophical  deity  that  has  been 
for  ages  the  God  of  Christian  theology,  and  largely 
of  Christian  faith  and  worship.  I  have  already 
brought  out  the  irreconcilable  contradictions  that 
are  involved  in  this  traditional  dogma.  But  it  is 
deeply  intrenched  in  the  minds  of  men,  and  many 
will  no  doubt  continue  to  think  of  God  as  every- 
where and  yet  nowhere ;  as  always  existent  and  yet 
under  no  laws  of  time ;  as  incomprehensible  and 
yet  as  possessing  attributes  that  are  wholly  com- 
prehensible, else  they  could  not  be  defined ;  as  a 
God  of  love  and  yet  as  a  Being  above  all  passion 
or  affection  of  any  kind;  as  having  no  form  or 
place  of  existence  and  yet  as  tabernacled  in  the 
effulgence  and  glory  of  the  heavenly  places.  Now, 
as  to  all  this  view  of  God,  it  is  here  to  be  said 
that  the  new  inductive  theology  can  make  no  use 
of  it.  All  true  induction  proceeds  from  the  known 
to  the  unknown,  not  from  the  unknown  to  the 
known.  The  metaphysical  view  of  God,  therefore, 
cannot  be  accepted  by  the  inductive  method,  and 
so  it  must  proceed  by  a  new  path  of  its  own  to 


CONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    273 

form  its  conception  of  the  Father  of  all  souls  that 
man's  religious  nature  instinctively  intuits  and 
craves.  It  starts  with  a  concrete  personal  being, 
an  intuition  of  the  moral  consciousness  which  is  as 
fixed  and  radical  as  its  own  nature.  For  a  moral 
nature  involves  personality  and  cannot  exist  with- 
out it,  and  such  likewise  must  be  its  conception  of 
God.  Here  lies  the  very  basis  of  the  whole  doc- 
trine of  God.  The  moral  consciousness  of  man  can 
never  accept  a  pantheistic  God,  or  a  God  evolved 
from  the  concrete  into  the  abstract,  in  other  words, 
"the  absolute"  of  philosophy.  As  man's  moral 
and  religious  nature  develops,  and  the  light  of  na- 
ture and  history  reveals  to  him  more  and  more  of 
the  divine  wisdom  and  power  and  goodness,  his 
idea  of  God's  perfections  gains  in  breadth  and 
height,  but  never  can  lose  itself  in  any  transcen- 
dental speculation  that  removes  God  from  the 
horizon  of  personal  faith  into  some  region  of  un- 
knowable abstraction.  A  priori  philosophy  may 
predicate  a  First  Cause,  uncaused  or  self-caused, 
as  God,  but  no  inductive  facts  carry  the  mind 
thither,  and  the  religious  consciousness  remains 
steadfastly  within  the  limits  of  its  primary  intui- 
tions and  refuses  to  embark  on  a  speculative  sea 
that  has  no  shore.  Induction  finds  God  incon- 
ceivably great  and  wise  and  good,  but  further  it 
cannot  go,  and  at  this  point  leaves  Him  in  the 
mystery  that  must  eternally  surround  Him.  The 
new  theology  will  have  its  mysticism  as  well  as 
the  old,  but  while  it  will  be  ready  to  acknowledge 


274       EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

the  fact  which  all  the  media  of  revelation  unite  in 
declaring,  as  Plato  did,  that  "  God  is  hard  to  find, 
and  when  found  is  difficult  to  make  known  to 
others,"  it  will  nevertheless  agree  with  Paul  that 
"  God  is  not  far  from  every  one  of  us,  for  we  are 
also  his  offspring,"  and  that  men  therefore  "  should 
seek  God,  if  haply  they  might  feel  after  Him  and 
find  Him."  The  mysticism  of  the  old  theology  was 
irrational,  for  it  attempted  by  reason  to  transcend 
reason.  But  the  mysticism  of  religious  faith  which 
through  love  believes  and  trusts  God,  and  is  able 
thus  to  look  beyond  the  things  that  are  seen  and 
temporal  to  the  things  that  are  not  seen  and  eter- 
nal, —  such  a  mysticism  was  that  of  Christ  himself 
when  he  said,  "  The  kingdom  of  God  cometh  not 
with  observation ;  "  "  it  is  within  you."  The  mys- 
ticism that  "  walks  by  faith  and  not  by  sight "  is 
that  of  Paul ;  but  the  mysticism  that  is  built  on 
the  Platonic  philosophy  of  the  supreme  reality  of 
universal  ideas  is  that  of  all  pantheists  from  Plo- 
tinus  to  John  Scotus  Erigena  and  Eckhart  and 
Hegel.  Nature  is  mystical  when  it  points  to  some- 
thing behind  itself  of  which  it  is  the  material  ex- 
pression. History  is  mystical  when  it  reveals  the 
movements  of  a  divine  providence.  The  moral 
consciousness  of  man  grows  mystical  when  it  be- 
gins to  say,  as  Christ  said  at  twelve  years  of  age, 
"  Wist  ye  not  that  I  must  be  about  my  Father's 
business  ?  "  But  it  is  the  mysticism  of  personality 
and  of  theism,  not  of  pantheism.  The  new  the- 
ology, whatever  else  it  may  be,  will  not  be  panthe- 


CONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    275 

istic.  All  the  true  media  of  divine  revelation  — 
natui'e,  history,  man's  moral  consciousness,  the 
Bible,  Christ — speak  the  same  word  about  God, 
and  that  word  is  theism,  in  its  monotheistic,  not  in 
its  pantheistic  form. 

We  are  here  brought  face  to  face  with  that 
evolution  of  the  doctrine  of  God  which  forms  the 
most  remarkable  chapter  in  the  history  of  the 
old  theology, — the  dogma  of  the  Trinity.  This 
dogma  is  not  peculiar  to  Christianity.  It  had  a 
long  history  in  the  Ethnic  religions  before  Christ 
was  born,  and  the  philosophical  presuppositions 
that  lie  behind  the  Christian  form  of  it  lie  equally 
behind  all  the  Ethnic  trinities.  The  idea  of  a 
trinity  in  the  Godhead,  or  of  trinities  in  the  pan- 
theon of  divine  beings,  is  one  of  the  most  original 
and  widely  spread  religious  notions  of  the  human 
race,  and  seems  based  on  many  trinitarian  analo- 
gies in  nature  and  the  human  soul,  and  in  the 
structure  of  family  and  social  life.  The  theologi- 
cal assumption  that  the  Christian  dogma  is  a  new 
revealed  truth,  dating  from  the  Christian  era,  is 
an  unhistorical  tradition  that  like  so  many  others 
has  been  shown  by  historical  criticism  to  be  ut- 
terly without  foundation.  The  earlier  chapters  of 
this  book  have  given  the  history  of  the  stages  of 
evolution  through  which  the  trinitarian  dogma 
passed  before  it  reached  its  complete  form  in  the 
Nicene  and  pseudo-Athanasian  creeds.  It  has 
also  been  shown  that  the  dogma  had  its  philo- 
sophical origin  in  the  mediation  ideas  of  the  Pla- 


276        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tonic  dualism.  The  history  of  the  Ethnic  trinities, 
moreover,  brings  out  the  fact  that  the  mediation 
principle  had  much  to  do  with  the  development  of 
the  Ethnic  trinitarianism.  In  truth,  nothing  is 
historically  clearer  than  that  the  trinitarian  ideas 
out  of  which  the  various  Trinities  grew,  whether 
Ethnic  or  Christian,  have  a  common  origin  in 
man's  religious  consciousness.  But  the  Christian 
Trinity,  as  fully  developed,  has  a  character  of  its 
own,  and  two  radically  opposite  forms  of  it,  as 
the  history  has  shown,  are  distinctly  revealed, — 
the  tritheistic  and  the  monistic  or  Sabellian.  The 
point  to  which  I  wish  to  call  special  attention  here 
is  the  fact  that  neither  of  these  forms  of  trini- 
tarian dogma  are  reconcilable  with  monotheism. 
Tritheistic  Trinitarianism  makes  three  divine  Be- 
ings, Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost,  form  in  some 
metaphysical  way  one  God.  Such  a  doctrine  can- 
not be  made  monotheistic.  Three  personal  Gods 
cannot  by  any  logical  twist  be  made  to  equal  one 
personal  God.  We  know  how  Origen  and  Athar 
nasius  attempted  to  unite  a  monotheistic  doctrine 
with  Trinitarianism.  Subordinationism  was  the 
magic  word.  But  if  there  are  three  divine  Be- 
ings, though  subordinate  to  each  other,  how  can  it 
be  said  that  God  is  one  ?  Such  a  trinitarianism 
must  involve  tritheism.  As  to  the  Sabellian  or 
monistic  Trinitarianism,  it  is  really  no  trinitarian- 
ism at  all,  but  simply  a  pantheistic  cloak  under 
which  theologians  have  striven  to  hide  their  uni- 
tarian tendencies.     To  speak  of  Father,  Son,  and 


CONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY    277 

Holy  Ghost  as  a  Trinity,  and  to  mean  by  them 
only  three  modes  of  operation  of  the  one  personal 
God,  is  simply  to  play  hide  and  seek  with  lan- 
guage. 

What  now  has  the  new  inductive  theology  to 
say  to  such  trinitarian  orthodoxy  ?  Simply  this  : 
that  it  is  unhistorical  and  irrational,  and  further, 
a  dogma  to  which  the  religious  consciousness  does 
not  respond ;  for,  as  we  have  seen,  the  new  the- 
ology is  bound  to  be  monotheistic.  Dogmatic 
Trinitarianism  is  either  polytheistic  or  pantheistic 
in  its  very  nature  and  must  be  classed  philosophi- 
cally in  one  or  the  other  of  these  positions,  how- 
ever hard  theologians  may  struggle  against  it. 
But  the  true  voices  through  which  God  speaks  to 
men,  the  voices  of  nature  and  history  and  man's 
own  moral  being,  the  voices  of  Scripture  and 
Christ,  are  in  a  different  strain.  They  speak  only 
of  God  as  a  single  personal  holy  and  loving  being. 
It  may  be,  as  some  think,  that  there  is  no  such 
God  at  all ;  but  one  thing  is  certain,  that  the  media 
of  divine  revelation  all  point  that  way,  and  such  a 
Being  is  the  only  one  that  man's  moral  nature  can 
grasp  and  love  and  worship. 

Thus  the  old  feud  between  the  Trinitarian  and 
Unitarian  has  lost  it  vigor,  simply  because  the 
theological  springs  that  fed  it  have  dried  up.  The 
very  terms  "  trinitarian  "  and  "  unitarian  "  have  no 
longer  any  other  than  a  historical  antiquarian  sig- 
nificance. The  one  was  the  correlate  of  the  other. 
Neither  has  any  meaning  without  the  other.     His- 


278        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

tory  with  its  potent  dissolving  force  has  destroyed 
the  very  weapons  with  which  the  old  combatants 
fought.  The  theological  assumptions  on  which 
Stuart  and  Channing  stood  together,  while  disa- 
greeing as  to  the  conclusions  to  be  drawn  from 
them,  have  utterly  perished,  and  there  is  no  ground 
left  on  which  the  battle  may  proceed.  The  very 
watchwords  and  signals  of  orthodoxy  or  heterodoxy 
have  lost  their  old  significance.  "  Trinitarian  "  and 
"  Unitarian  "  have  no  place  in  the  vocabulary  of 
the  new  theology.  Of  the  two  terms, "  Unitarian  " 
etymologically  .contains  the  most  of  truth,  for  on 
one  side,  at  least,  it  stands  squarely  for  the  single 
personality  of  God.  But  it  suffers,  as  does  its 
counterpart  "Trinitarian,"  from  the  history  that 
lies  behind  it,  and  cannot  easily  be  disconnected 
from  it,  and  therefore  is  not  a  word  to  interpret 
the  new  theology.  "Theism,"  or  more  strictly 
"  monotheism,"  is  the  only  word  that  is  free  from 
the  danger  of  misunderstanding  or  reproach. 


CHAPTER  Xni 

THE   NEW   CHKISTOLOGY 

There  remains  the  cliristology  of  tlie  old  the- 
ology, or  the  doctrine  of  Christ's  person.  This 
has  always  been  made  an  adjunct  of  the  doctrine 
of  God,  and  thus  becomes  an  appendix  of  the 
dogma  of  the  Trinity.  The  doctrine  of  Christ's 
true  deity  having  been  settled,  there  arose  the 
question  of  his  humanity.  Hence  the  Chalcedon 
definition,  by  which  the  dogma  of  the  God-man 
was  set  forth  as  one  Person  subsisting  in  two  dis- 
tinct natures.  The  attempt  was  thus  made  to 
bridge  the  chasm  between  the  divine  and  the 
human  by  the  incarnation  of  God  in  human  nature 
in  such  a  way  that  aU  the  divine  attributes  were 
preserved,  while  the  human  attributes  of  a  man 
were  assumed.  Jesus  Christ  was  therefore  wholly 
God  and  wholly  man,  that  is,  the  God-man.  How 
such  a  bald  antinomy  could  have  been  adopted  by 
theologians  who  were  adepts  in  the  Aristotelian 
and  Platonic  philosophies  is  truly  a  marvel.  The 
real  explanation  is  that  it  was  forced  upon  them  by 
the  exigencies  of  the  political  as  well  as  the  theo- 
logical situation.  Two  great  parties  were  opposed 
to  each  other,  one  defending  the  unity  of  Christ's 


280        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

person,  the  other  its  duality.  The  Chalcedon 
definition  cut  the  Gordian  knot  by  its  dogma  of 
one  person  in  two  natures.  I  have  abeady  ex- 
plained the  theological  contradiction  here  involved. 
To  say  that  God  as  a  personal  divine  being  is  so 
united  by  a  miraculous  incarnation  and  birth  with 
a  human  being  or  nature  that  the  two  are  hence- 
forth personally  one,  and  are  equally  both  God  and 
man,  is  equivalent  to  saying  that  1  =  2,  or,  to  put  it 
psychologically,  that  there  is  in  Christ  a  complete 
human  nature  with  all  the  attributes  and  qualities 
of  such  a  nature,  and  yet  with  no  distinct  human 
personality,  or,  still  again,  to  show  on  another  side 
its  contradictory  character,  that  the  God-man, 
Jesus  Christ,  is  both  omniscient  and  ignorant, 
omnipotent  and  not  omnipotent,  eternal  and  tem- 
poral, eternally  begotten  and  begotten  in  time,  a 
Son  of  God  and  a  son  of  man,  having  God  as  his 
Father  in  one  way,  and  Joseph  as  his  father,  or  at 
least  Mary  as  his  mother,  in  another  way.  Now 
what  was  the  object  of  aU  this  unhistorical  and 
unscientific  violation  of  logical  and  psychological 
laws?  Simply  to  sustain  the  dogma  of  Christ's 
deity,  and  that  also  of  the  Trinity  which  had  grown 
up  around  it. 

And  now  we  see  why  the  doctrine  of  Christ's 
person  has  always  been  connected  with  theology 
in  its  more  contracted  sense,  or  the  doctrine  of 
God,  and  not  with  anthropology^  or  the  doctrine 
of  man.  It  is  the  divine  side  that  is  the  essential 
side,  and  the  human  side  is  wholly  sacrificed  to  it. 


THE  NEW  CHRISTOLOGY  281 

Christ  is  essential  God,  not  essential  man.  It  is 
the  divine  personality  that  rules  him,  not  the 
human.  All  himian  traits  are  seeming,  not  real. 
His  ignorance  is  only  a  seeming  ignorance.  All 
through  the  history  of  orthodoxy,  Christ's  human- 
ity has  been  only  a  cloak  to  hide  the  reality  of 
his  deity.  The  recent  theory  of  "  Kenosis  "  is  only 
a  metaphysical  makeshift  to  cover  the  real  contra- 
diction 'which  in  the  older  view  stands  out  visibly 
to  every  intelligent  eye. 

How  completely  unhistorical  all  this  is,  the  pre- 
ceding chapters  have  shown,  and  it  is  scarcely 
needful  to  raise  the  question,  what  the  new  the- 
ology will  say  to  it.  With  the  old  theology  of  the 
Trinity  goes  also  the  old  christology,  both  rest- 
ing upon  the  same  speculative  foundations.  The 
inductive  historical  method  brings  Christ  back  to 
us  as  a  true  member  of  the  human  race,  and  turns 
christology  into  a  branch  of  anthropology.  But 
while  he  is  thus  historically  a  true  man  under  hu- 
man conditions,  his  moral  eminence  is  not  thereby 
at  all  endangered,  nor  his  unique  place  among  the 
media  of  divine  revelation  lost.  It  was  not  neces- 
sary that  the  moral  consciousness  of  Christ  should 
be  divinized  in  order  that  he  might  become  a  true 
channel  of  God's  gospel  of  love  and  grace.  Kather 
would  such  a  deifying  of  him  have  unfitted  him 
for  such  a  mission.  Only  through  a  human  con- 
sciousness could  God  reveal  himself  to  human 
beings.  The  most  direct  revelation  of  God's  love  to 
us  is  through  a  human  love.     If  it  were  true  that 


282        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

God,  in  order  to  open  a  way  of  redemption  to 
man,  must  become  flesh  and  dwell  among  us,  the 
only  method  would  be  to  enter  the  human  race  in 
the  natural  ordinary  way,  and  so  completely  ally 
himself  with  human  conditions  ;  not  by  an  unnat- 
ural miraculous  act  which  would  thereby  separate 
him  from  the  beings  he  came  to  save.  Strange 
indeed  that  God,  to  become  truly  man,  must  come 
in  such  a  way  as  to  make  men  doubt  whether  he 
could  be  the  man  of  true  flesh  and  blood  he  was 
proclaiming  himself  to  be,  and,  in  doing  it,  break 
the  very  laws  of  his  own  creation  !  Christ  then, 
because  human,  does  not  cease  to  be  the  moral 
and  religious  leader  of  the  race ;  and,  though  the 
old  christology  is  reduced  from  theology  to  an- 
thropology, there  is  left  large  scope  for  a  new 
christology  based  on  the  scientific  and  historical 
facts  connected  with  the  evolution  of  human 
nature,  especially  on  its  moral  and  religious  side. 
There  is  no  limit  that  can  be  set  to  the  growth  of 
man's  moral  consciousness.  Compare  the  un- 
clothed savage  of  the  cave-dwellers  with  the  en- 
lightened and  cultured  man  of  to-day ;  "  and  it 
doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be."  Why 
may  not  a  man  have  appeared,  in  advance  of  his 
age  and  surroundings,  so  exceptional  in  moral 
development  and  consciousness  as  to  become  and 
remain  a  guide  and  example  to  his  feUow  men  in 
all  religious  faith  and  conduct  ?  Such  is  a  true 
inductive  christology.  All  this  talk  of  which  the 
air  to-day  is  so  full,  about  the  divineness  of  man, 


THE  NEW  CHRISTOLOGY  283 

is  really  caught  from  the  scientific  law  of  evolution 
which  shows  man  to  be  a  progressive  being,  of 
unlimited  capacity.  Whittier  only  turned  science 
into  poetry  when  he  wrote :  — 

"  And  step  by  step  since  time  began 
I  see  the  steady  gain  of  man." 

No  wonder,  as  he  turned  his  gaze  from  the  past 
and  present  to  the  future,  that  his  prophetic  vision 
gathered  more  and  more  of  hope  and  cheer,  and 
that  he  sang  on  :  — 

"  Through  the  harsh  voices  of  our  day 
A  low  sweet  prelude  finds  its  way. 
Through  clouds  of  doubt  and  creeds  of  fear 
A  light  is  breaking  calm  and  clear." 

Surely  it  is  no  mere  poet's  dream,  that  man  is 
moving  ever  forward  to  higher  and  higher  stages 
of  intellectual  and  moral  attainment.  It  is  the 
last  word  of  science  itself,  that  what  is  best  and 
divinest  in  our  conceptions  of  God  —  his  moral 
attributes  of  righteousness,  truth,  justice,  love, 
mercy,  and  compassion  —  is  within  the  reach  of 
every  son  and  daughter  of  our  human  race.  The 
idea  of  Christ's  divineness  is  but  the  prefigure- 
ment,  in  one  illustrious  supreme  example,  of  the 
ultimate  divinization  of  humanity  itself.  Nay, 
what  does  the  daring  hypothesis  of  Phillips  Brooks 
—  that  there  is  an  eternal  humanity  in  God  — 
mean,  if  not  just  this,  that  the  divine  Fatherhood, 
which  man's  moral  consciousness  feels  intuitively 
and  strives  to  bring  within  the  ranges  of  his  faith 
and  love,  is  only  the  transcendent  background  and 


284        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

picture  eternally  stamped  in  the  nature  of  things 
of  man's  own  inextinguishable  sense  of  sonship,  — 
a  truth  which  Paul  only  echoed  from  Chi-ist's 
teaching  when  he  called  men  "  sons  of  God,  and 
if  sons  then  heirs,  heirs  of  God  and  joint  heirs 
with  Christ."  What  is  the  difference  between  the 
christology  of  Paul,  when  accurately  measured, 
and  that  of  the  new  inductive  theology?  The 
doctrine,  supposed  to  be  so  original  in  theological 
thought,  of  the  consubstantiality  of  man  with  God, 
is  merely  a  metaphysical  exposition  from  a  mo- 
nistic point  of  view  of  an  old  truth,  and  when  re- 
duced to  its  lowest  terms  means  simply  that  man 
was  created  in  the  divine  image,  and  is  capable  of 
rising  by  unending  stages  of  progress  towards  God 
himself.  On  such  a  basis  metaphysics  and  science 
may  meet  and  "  kiss  each  other,"  —  the  only  differ- 
ence being  that  while  metaphysical  theology  pro- 
ceeds in  a  pantheistic  way  from  the  divineness  of 
God  to  the  divineness  of  man,  the  new  inductive 
theology  proceeds  from  man  as  under  a  law  of  his- 
torical evolution  that  involves  a  continuous  upward 
moral  progress  to  God  as  the  end  of  that  progress. 
Those  words  which  Athanasius  uttered  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  Platonic  dualism,  "  Christ  was 
made  man  that  man  might  be  made  divine,"  the 
new  theology  may  accept  from  the  standpoint  of 
scientific  evolution.  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott,  in  his 
Lowell  lectures  on  the  "Evolution  of  Christian- 
ity," expressly  excepted  Christ  from  the  law  of 
evolution  which  he  made  universal  in  its  range 


THE  NEW  CHRISTOLOGY  286 

outside  of  him.  But  tliis  is  to  destroy  the  very 
order  of  history  and  the  world.  There  can  be  no 
exception  to  this  order.  Nor  is  it  needed.  That 
Christ  may  be  a  moral  leader  of  the  race,  he  must 
be  under  the  law  of  race  evolution,  and  so  a  mem- 
ber of  it.  But  this  is  not  to  take  away  with  one 
hand  what  is  given  by  the  other.  Moral  lead- 
ership and  supremacy  does  not  involve  or  necessi- 
tate a  metaphysical  chasm  between  such  a  leader 
and  those  he  leads.  From  the  standpoint  of  man's 
generic  relationship  with  God,  bearing  in  mind 
also  that  law  of  evolution  by  which  individuals  of 
the  race  may  rise  above  their  fellows  in  moral  and 
intellectual  advance,  as  we  may  speak  of  all  men 
as  having  in  them  an  element  of  divinity,  so  we 
may  speak  of  Christ  as  diviner  than  other  men 
and  more  closely  related  to  God,  and  so  the  Son  of 
God  in  a  peculiar  sense,  without  however  differ- 
entiating him  from  other  men,  as  if  he  did  not 
belong  with  them  to  a  common  human  species. 
The  old  dualism  which  drew  a  hard-and-fast  line 
of  separation  between  the  divine  and  the  human  is 
certainly  put  out  of  court  by  scientific  monism  as 
the  result  of  the  law  of  natural  evolution.  The 
moral  nature  and  attributes  of  God  and  man  are 
essentially  one.  The  moral  divineness  of  man  is 
a  natural  corollary.  The  peculiar  divineness  of 
Christ  follows  as  a  matter  of  course,  if  his  moral 
consciousness  was  more  complete,  and  rose  to 
higher  and  clearer  spheres  of  vision.  The  truth 
is  that  the  new  science  and  history,  with  their 


286        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

common  law  of  evolution,  have  given  the  religious 
thinker  an  entirely  new  point  of  view  from  which 
to  behold  God  and  his  relations  to  men,  together 
with  the  mediatorial  function  of  Christ.  The 
chasm  which  Athanasius  fixed  between  God  and 
his  moral  creatures  is  gone.  The  true  dualistic 
chasm  is  not  between  God  and  man,  but  between 
man  and  the  material  world.  For  between  God 
and  matter  there  can  be  no  moral  relationship  or 
unity.  But  if  human  beings  are  created  in  the 
divine  image,  as  all  the  media  of  revelation  prove, 
then  there  is  a  scientifically  and  historically  true 
sense  in  which  they  are  generically  divine.  They 
are  indeed  "  pai-takers  of  the  divine  nature ; "  and 
if  the  degree  and  measure  of  moral  consciousness 
be  the  true  standard,  as  it  must  be,  of  that  "  par- 
taking," then  Christ  surely  must  be  in  the  highest 
sense  divine.  But  this  does  not  separate  him  from 
us.  Eather  is  the  closeness  of  his  moral  relation- 
ship with  us  increased.  No  bond  is  so  close  as 
love.  But  "  he  loved  us,"  as  no  other  has,  "  and 
gave  himseK  for  us."  Not  in  kind,  but  in  degree 
only,  is  he  differentiated  from  us.  Dr.  Abbott,  in 
asserting  this,  was  on  firm  historical  ground. 

It  is  interesting  to  note,  in  passing,  how  a  cycle 
of  theological  thought  that  is  in  process  of  dissolu- 
tion connects  itself  with  a  new  cycle  that  begins  as 
the  result  of  a  radical  revolution.  The  consub- 
stantiality  of  man  with  God  as  a  metaphysical  con- 
ception belongs  to  an  old  and  outworn  theology, 
but,  in  the  new  form  of  the  scientific  doctrine  of 


THE  NEW  CHRISTOLOGY  287 

evolution,  the  divineness  of  man  becomes  a  vital 
truth,  and  out  of  it  arises  a  christology  that 
removes  Jesus  of  Nazareth  indeed  from  the  order 
of  Absolute  Deity,  but  at  the  same  time  exalts 
him  to  a  place  of  moral  eminence  that  is  secure 
and  supreme. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE   NEW    CHRISTIAN   ATONEMENT 

There  is  one  other  doctrine  of  the  old  theology 
that  is  directly  connected  with  its  christology,  and 
in  fact  is  built  upon  it,  which  cannot  here  be  left 
unnoticed,  since  it  is  made  practically  the  central 
note  of  that  theology  as  a  whole.  I  refer  to  the 
doctrine  of  the  atonement.  Perhaps  there  is  no 
better  example  of  the  law  of  historical  evolution, 
when  once  it  begins  to  work,  than  this  one  of  the 
evolution  of  the  old  orthodox  doctrine  of  the  atone- 
ment. There  are  three  distinct  stages  of  growth 
of  the  doctrine  in  the  New  Testament  writings. 
The  first  stage  is  the  teaching  of  Christ  himself ; 
the  second  is  that  of  Paul;  the  third  is  found 
in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  It  should  be  said  at 
the  outset  that  the  term  "  atonement "  in  its  tradi- 
tional orthodox  meaning  of  a  propitiatory  sacrifice 
occurs  once  only  in  the  King  James  version,  while 
in  the  new  revised  version  it  gives  place  to  the 
word  "  reconciliation^^''  which  is  the  right  transla^ 
tion  of  KaraXXayq.  This  word,  with  its  correspond- 
ing verb,  /caToAAao-o-o),  is  used  nine  times  by  Paul, 
but  appears  nowhere  else  in  the  New  Testament. 
The  Greek  term  properly  means  a  change  from 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      289 

enmity  to  friendship,  as  when  Paul  wrote  :  "  Let 
the  wife  remain  unmarried  or  be  reconciled  to  her 
husband."  This  is  the  plain  meaning,  also,  in  aU 
the  other  uses  of  it  by  Paul.  Moreover,  in  Paul's 
view  the  reconciliation  was  to  proceed  from  man 
to  God,  not  from  God  to  man,  as  is  shown  in  the 
passage  in  2  Corinthians  v.  18,  19,  where  Paul 
speaks  of  God  as  "  reconciling  men  to  himself, 
not  imputing  their  trespasses  unto  them."  Paul 
regards  the  whole  redemptive  process  as  starting 
from  God,  who  through  Christ  gave  his  ministers 
"  the  ministry  of  reconciliation."  According  to 
this  doctrine,  God  needed  no  mediatorial  expiatory 
sacrifice  or  offering  in  order  to  his  reconcilement 
with  man,  but  initiated  a  movement  to  bring  about 
the  reconcilement  of  man  to  himself.  This  of 
course  is  not  the  old  orthodox  doctrine  of  atone- 
ment at  all.  Paul's  view  of  reconciliation  is  es- 
sentially that  of  Christ,  though  he  adds  a  new 
feature,  as  we  shall  see. 

As  to  Christ's  own  view,  he  had  no  conception 
of  an  atonement  in  its  sacrificial  sense  as  a  blood 
offering  for  sin.  He  protested  against  the  bloody 
sacrifices  of  the  Mosaic  law,  as  having  in  them- 
selves any  efficacy  in  taking  away  sin.  He  made 
little  of  the  temple  rites  that  were  still  continued 
in  his  day.  "  One  greater  than  the  temple  is 
here,"  he  said  in  protest  against  the  Pharisaic 
traditions  of  his  day,  by  which  the  letter  of  the 
law  had  been  raised  above  its  spirit,  adding  "  but 
if  ye  had  known  what  this   meaneth,  '  I   desire 


290        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

mercy  and  not  sacrifice,'  ye  would  not  have  con- 
demned the  guiltless."  His  own  doctrine  of  sac- 
rifice was  that  of  the  later  prophets  and  psalmists, 
the  sacrifice  of  the  heart,  the  self-sacrifice  of  love. 
This  was  to  hun  the  meaning  of  the  cross.  It 
was  the  emblem  of  a  sacrifice  of  self  for  others 
even  unto  death.  Such  sacrifice  was  the  highest 
form  of  righteous  living,  it  was  salvation.  "  He 
that  loseth  his  life  shall  save  it."  Later  literalistic 
interpretation  has  seized  on  the  term  "  ransom " 
which  Christ  once  casually  used,  and  has  made  it 
to  mean  a  propitiatory  vicarious  sacrifice.^  But 
this  is  to  strain  its  real  significance,  as  the  context 
shows,  and  as  all  Christ's  other  teachings  also 
show.  Christ  was  declaring  that  his  ti'ue  mission 
"  was  not  to  be  ministered  unto  but  to  minister." 
It  was  a  mission  of  service  for  others  even  to  the 
point  of  giving  his  life,  and  the  power  of  such  a 
service  in  his  view  was  its  moral  effect  on  men, 
not  its  sacrificial  effect  on  God,  as  if  there  could 
be  any  remission  of  sin  by  the  shedding  of  blood. 
Christ  never  taught  such  a  doctrine.  It  was  as 
far  as  possible  from  his  own  point  of  view.  "  I, 
if  I  be  lifted  up  from  the  earth,  wiU  draw  all  men 
unto  me."  The  effect  of  his  death  was  to  move 
men's  hearts  by  the  spectacle  of  love,  not  to  pro- 
pitiate and  satisfy  the  divine  wrath  or  law.  His 
doctrine  of  God's  attitude  to  man  was  that  of  a 
Father  ready  to  forgive  every  penitent,  not  that 

^  See  appendix  C.   on  Prof.  Pfleiderer's  article  in  the  New 
World. 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      291 

of  an  offended  Being  who  demanded  a  ransom  in 
the  way  of  a  bloody  sacrifice.  Such  a  view  of  God 
was  repugnant  to  him.  The  later  doctrine  of  a 
mediator  who  comes  between  two  parties  that  are 
estranged  in  order  to  reconcile  them  by  the  shed- 
ding of  his  blood  seems  never  to  have  occurred  to 
him.  His  parable  of  the  prodigal  son,  which  con- 
tains the  very  essence  of  his  whole  gospel,  has  no 
mediation  element.  No  third  person  comes  in  be- 
tween the  father  and  his  prodigal  child,  and  none 
is  needed.  How  would  the  whole  significance  and 
pathos  of  the  story  have  been  destroyed,  had  a 
third  person  been  introduced  to  make  peace  be- 
tween them.  What  Christ  taught  in  this  parable 
was  not  a  substitutional  atonement,  but  immediate 
at-one-ment.  The  father  and  his  wayward  son 
were  made  one  directly  and  without  any  go-between. 
How  clearly  and  touchingly  is  this  fact  brought 
out  in  the  story  !  The  prodigal,  already  penitent, 
is  on  the  way  to  his  father's  house.  What  now 
does  the  father  do  ?  Does  he  send  a  messenger  to 
state  the  terms  on  which  he  wiU  allow  his  son's 
return  ?  Not  so.  "  While  he  was  yet  a  great  way 
off  his  father  saw  him  and  was  moved  with  com- 
passion and  ran  and  fell  on  his  neck  and  kissed 
him."  Such  is  the  gospel  method  of  reconciliation. 
What  a  travesty  upon  it  was  the  later  doctrine  of 
atonement  that  usurped  its  place !  That  doctrine 
is  not  Christian,  but  Jewish  and  Pagan.  It  rests 
on  one  of  the  earliest  superstitions  of  the  race, 
viz.,  that  God  may  be  appeased  or  propitiated  by 


292        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

offerings,  especially  by  such  as  involve  the  death 
of  the  victim.  The  more  costly  and  precious  the 
sacrifice,  the  more  efficacious  it  would  be.  Hence 
human  sacrifices  were  common  on  extraordinary 
occasions.  With  growing  civilization  and  enlight- 
enment, the  practice  of  offering  human  victims 
became  obsolete,  and  generally  libations  and  cakes 
took  the  place  of  the  more  bloody  forms  of  animal 
sacrifice.  It  is  one  of  the  astonishing  facts  of  his- 
tory that  Christian  theology  should  have  seized  on 
such  a  relic  of  barbarism,  and  should  have  incor- 
porated it,  in  its  grossest  form  of  a  human  victim, 
into  its  doctrine  of  redemption.  Plainly  pagan  as 
this  whole  atonement  doctrine  is,  it  was  the  more 
readily  accepted  as  an  article  of  Christian  belief 
by  the  uncritical  use  of  passages  of  Scripture 
which  were  interpreted,  on  the  principle  of  "  an- 
alogy of  faith,"  as  representing  Christ's  own  doc- 
trine. But  historical  criticism  has  demolished  this 
principle  of  interpretation,  and  with  it  go  the  doc- 
trines built  upon  it.  Critical  scholars  no  longer 
regard  Christ  as  thinking  or  declaring  himself 
"  the  lamb  of  God  "  in  any  sacrificial  sense,  because 
the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  makes  John  the 
Baptist  call  him  so,  or  because  the  Revelation, 
once  ascribed  to  John  the  Apostle,  employs  the 
same  term  so  frequently.  Both  of  these  writings 
represent  a  later  stage  of  evolution  of  doctrine, 
when  there  was  a  falling  back  on  Jewish  concep- 
tions of  sacrifice,  and  when  anticipations  of  Chris- 
tian ideas  were  sought  in  the  Old  Testament.  But 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      293 

behind  all  such  exegetical  perversions  there  still 
come  clearly  to  view  Christ's  own  original  teach- 
ings. The  story  of  the  prodigal  son  can  never  be 
blotted  out  of  man's  heart,  and  on  it  will  rise  the 
new  theology  of  man's  at-one-ment  with  God. 

The  second  stage  of  evolution  began  with  Paul. 
While  holding  to  Christ's  teaching  of  at-one-ment 
rather  than  atonement,  Paul  introduced  a  new  ele- 
ment which  practically  changed  the  point  of  view 
of  the  whole  doctrine.  This  element  he  derived 
from  Greek  philosophy,  viz.,  the  mediation  doctrine 
of  the  Platonic  dualism,  which  in  Philo  was  devel- 
oped into  the  Logos  doctrine  and  afterward  in  this 
form  made  such  a  figure  in  Christian  trinitarian 
theology.  The  Greek  term  /mco-iVj/s  (mediator)  as 
a  New  Testament  expression  first  appears  in  Paul. 
It  had  already  been  employed  in  Philo  to  desig- 
nate the  mediating  character  of  the  Logos.  Jewish 
theology  had  no  such  dualistic  theory,  and  never 
developed  a  Logos  mediation  doctrine.  Hence  its 
entire  absence  from  Christ's  teaching.  In  this,  as 
in  many  other  respects,  Paul  was  the  real  founder 
of  dogmatic  Christian  theology.  He  introduced 
into  it  elements  of  Greek  speculative  thought  and 
created  for  it  a  new  philosophical  basis.  Christ 
became  to  him  a  sort  of  middle  being  between  God 
and  man,  like  the  Logos  of  Philo,  and  hence  a  new 
feature  was  introduced  into  his  view  of  the  recon- 
ciliation of  man  with  God,  that,  namely,  of  a  go-be- 
tween or  mediator.  It  was  through  Christ,  as  such 
a  go-between,  that  God  reconciled  man  to  himself. 


294        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

But  Paul  went  no  further.  The  character  o£  the 
mode  of  reconciliation  was  not  essentially  changed. 
God's  love  is  still  behind  all.  It  is  true  that  Paul 
occasionally  employs  the  sacrificial  language  of  the 
Old  Testament  in  setting  forth  the  gospel  doctrine 
of  redemption.  This  is  not  surprising  when  we 
consider  his  rabbinical  education.  His  mind  was 
steeped  in  Old  Testament  ideas  and  imagery,  and 
he  constantly  recurs  to  them  in  his  explanations  of 
the  new  gospel  that  he  had  received.  But  to  take 
such  language  literally  is  to  mistake  Paul's  whole 
meaning.  Take,  for  example,  the  term  "  righteous- 
ness," and  observe  in  the  Romans  how  he  gives  to 
it  an  entirely  new  gospel  meaning.  The  gospel 
righteousness  is  not  the  old  righteousness  of  law 
and  wrath,  but  the  newly  revealed  righteousness  of 
love  and  mercy.  Hence  Paul  opposed  the  Jewish 
legalism  in  which  he  had  been  brought  up,  and 
proclaimed  the  new  doctrine  of  a  righteousness  or 
ground  of  acceptance  with  God,  which  was  not 
of  works  but  of  faith.  Just  so  in  his  use  of  the 
terms  "  wrath,"  "  propitiation,"  "  redeem,"  "  jus- 
tify." They  formed  a  part  of  the  old  sacrificial 
language,  but  a  new  sense  was  given  them.  A 
crucial  passage  is  that  in  Romans  v.  Here,  as 
elsewhere,  God  himself  is  made  the  ultimate  source 
of  the  redemptive  process.  "  God  commended  his 
own  love  toward  us,  in  that,  while  we  were  yet  sin- 
ners, Christ  died  for  us.  Much  more  then,  being 
justified  by  his  blood,  shall  we  be  saved  from  the 
wrath  (of  God)  through  him.     For  if,  while  we 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      295 

were  enemies,  we  were  reconciled  to  God  through 
the  death  of  his  Son,  much  more,  being  reconciled, 
shall  we  be  saved  by  his  life."  Here  Paul  plainly 
sets  forth  the  doctrine  of  a  mediatorial  sacrifice  as 
the  way  of  reconciliation  between  man  and  God. 
So  far  he  was  still  a  Jew.  But  does  he  here  hold 
that  Christ's  death  had  for  its  object  to  change 
God's  attitude  from  one  of  enmity  and  anger  to 
reconcilement  and  love  ?  Surely  not.  God's  own 
love  was  behind  Christ's  death,  and  the  object  of 
that  death  was  to  change  man's  attitude  from  one 
of  enmity,  as  the  result  of  sin,  to  one  of  reconcile- 
ment and  restored  sonship.  The  key  of  the  true 
interpretation  is  lost,  if  it  is  not  noted  that  Paul 
employs  the  old  sacrificial  language  in  a  new  Chris- 
tian sense,  —  a  key  that  Paul  himseK  has  given  in 
the  previous  chapters  of  the  Epistle.  "  Wrath," 
for  example,  is  no  longer  a  divine  anger  that  de- 
mands a  bloody  expiation  and  atonement,  but  is 
changed  by  the  gospel  into  a  new  revelation  of 
divine  love  shining  through  Christ's  sacrifice  and 
seeking  man's  salvation.  Thus  interpreted,  the 
passage  is  in  complete  harmony  with  Paul's  other 
statements  concerning  the  ground  and  process  of 
reconciliation  between  man  and  God.  His  doctrine 
everywhere  is  that  God's  own  love  is  the  procuring 
cause  of  Christ's  mission,  and  that  its  object  was 
not  to  propitiate  the  divine  feeling,  but  to  recon- 
cile mankind  to  God,  by  the  display  of  the  divine 
mercy  in  the  sacrifice  of  Calvary. 

But  while  Paul  thus  introduced  an  entirely  new 


296        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

element  into  Christ's  teaching,  viz.,  that  of  a  medi- 
ator and  of  a  mediatorial  sacrifice,  his  doctrine 
must  be  carefully  distinguished  from  the  third 
stage  in  the  evolution  of  the  traditional  dogma  of 
the  atonement,  which  first  appears  in  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews.  Here  for  the  first  and  only  time 
in  the  New  Testament  Christ  is  made  not  merely  a 
fi€(TLT7}?  or  mediating  principle,  but  a  sacrificial 
victim  to  propitiate  God.  The  whole  Jewish  and 
Pagan  theory  of  bloody  offerings  to  expiate  sin  is 
squarely  affirmed  and  applied.  All  the  Old  Tes- 
tament sacrifices  are  made  antit3rpes  of  the  one 
great  sacrifice  made  by  Christ  himself.  "  Without 
the  shedding  of  blood,"  it  is  declared,  "  there  is  no 
remission."  "  Christ  hath  been  manifested  to  put 
away  sin  by  the  sacrifice  of  himself."  "  For  it  is 
impossible  that  the  blood  of  bulls  and  goats  should 
take  away  sin."  But  the  blood  of  Christ  does  thus 
avail.  "  We  have  been  sanctified  through  the  of- 
fering of  the  body  of  Jesus  Christ  once  for  all." 
Here  then  appears  in  fully  developed  form  the 
new  Christian  version  of  the  old  Jewish  and  Pagan 
doctrine  of  the  efficacy  of  a  blood  offering  to  God 
to  take  away  sin,  and  make  God  propitious  to  men. 
Note  how  Paul's  mediation  theory  is  changed.  The 
"  mediator "  no  longer  represents  God's  love  and 
mercy  in  the  effort  to  reconcile  men  to  God,  but 
becomes  a  representative  of  men  to  intercede  with 
God,  who  is  offended  and  wrathful  and  needs  to  be 
appeased.  The  reconciliation  is  not  manward,  as 
Paul  always  puts  it,  but  Godward.     It  is  not  man 


^or 


\^  or 

THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      29r^iilSi^ 

who  is  to  be  reconciled,  but  God.  It  is  to  the  Epis- 
tle to  the  Hebrews,  then,  that  we  owe  the  traditional 
orthodox  doctrine  of  the  atonement.  Its  adoption 
was  helped  by  the  tradition  that  the  Epistle  was 
written  by  Paul  and  so  expressed  his  own  view. 
So  uncritical  were  those  times  in  the  matter  of 
external  as  well  as  internal  evidence. 

It  is  impossible  here  to  give  any  extended  survey 
of  the  further  evolution  of  this  doctrine.  Little 
attention  was  paid  to  it  in  the  early  church.  Ire- 
naeus,  however,  struck  the  keynote  of  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews  in  declaring  that  "  God  was  offended 
with  us,"  and  in  making  this  the  ground  of  Christ's 
work  of  atonement.  Anselm's  "  Cur  Deus  Homo  " 
laid  the  foundations  of  the  mediaeval  doctrine  of 
the  atonement.  He  held  to  the  Godward  view, 
though  he  made  it  the  divine  law  and  justice  that 
demanded  a  satisfaction  or  full  equivalent  for 
man's  violation  of  that  law,  rather  than  the  divine 
offended  feeling.  But  in  the  later  Catholic  doc- 
trine the  divine  wrath  became  prominent.  Thomas 
Aquinas,  the  great  Catholic  theologian,  held  that 
Christ's  sufferings  were  "  penal,"  —  Christ  taking 
the  place  of  sinful  men  and  suffering  punishment 
in  their  stead.  Calvin,  whose  theology  has  had 
such  prevailing  influence  in  New  England,  held 
extreme  views  on  the  subject  of  the  atonement. 
Christ  "  was  destined  to  appease  the  wrath  of  God 
by  his  sacrifice."  "  God  was  our  enemy,  until  He 
was  reconciled  to  us  by  Christ."  "  He  took  the 
punishment  on  himself,  and  bore  what  by  the  just 


298        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

judgment  of  God  was  impending  over  sinners; 
with  his  own  blood  expiated  the  sins  which  ren- 
dered them  hateful  to  God."  The  later  Protest- 
ant reaction  to  the  so-called  "governmental"  or 
"  moral "  theories  is  in  the  line  of  a  return  to  Paul, 
and  the  at-one-ment  or  manward  view.  But  this 
is  to  be  said  about  all  such  modern  views  that  they 
are  still  based  on  the  mediation  doctrine  which 
Paul  introduced  from  Greek  dualistic  philosophy, 
and  stop  short  of  Christ's  own  teaching. 

What  now  the  new  theology  will  do  with  the 
Greek  metaphysical  theory  of  the  necessity  of  a 
semi-divine  /xco-m/s  or  mediator  between  God  and 
man,  who  must  offer  his  life  as  a  sacrifice  to  atone 
for  human  sin,  may  be  easUy  determined.  The 
inductive  historical  method  immediately  raises 
such  questions  as  these :  Did  Christ  authentically 
teach  any  such  doctrine  ?  Is  any  sacrificial  atone- 
ment necessary  to  enable  God  to  forgive  every 
penitent  soul?  Is  not  forgiveness  a  moral  act 
that  spontaneously  follows,  by  a  law  of  moral 
nature  and  necessity,  every  act  of  repentance  ? 
Does  not  the  petition  in  the  Lord's  prayer,  "  For- 
give us  our  trespasses,  as  we  forgive  them  that 
trespass  against  us,"  rest  on  this  assumption? 
Further,  is  not  man's  moral  relationship  to  God  so 
close  and  complete  as  to  render  such  a  metaphysi- 
cal mediation  needless  ?  And  if  it  is  such  a  theo- 
logical necessity,  why  did  not  Christ  teach  it  in 
his  parable  of  the  prodigal  son  ?  Such  questions 
show  what  the  central  point  of  difference  between 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      299 

the  old  theology  and  the  new  must  be.  It  is  as  to 
the  character  of  the  mediation  required  in  the 
relation  of  man  to  God  and  of  God  to  man,  and 
especially  in  the  matter  of  the  moral  separation 
brought  about  by  sin.  The  old  theology  insists  on 
the  necessity  of  a  metaphysical  mediatorship,  and 
declares  that  Christ  as  a  sufficient  mediator  must 
be  a  divine  being.  The  new  theology  dismisses  at 
once  the  metaphysical  speculations  of  Greek  phi- 
losophy and  its  dualistic  mediation  theory,  but 
allows  a  moral  or  spiritual  mediation  principle  as 
running  through  the  moral  kingdom.  The  spirit- 
ual relationship  of  all  moral  beings  involves  a 
mediation  element.  Motherhood  is  the  earliest 
illustration  to  every  child.  Souls  are  always  me- 
diating between  other  souls.  Christ  above  all 
others  was  such  a  messianic  mediator.  His  teach- 
ing was  fuU  of  mediating  elements.  The  parable 
of  the  prodigal  son  has  been  the  mediating  bridge 
over  which  many  a  soul  has  crossed  to  find  itself 
at  home  in  the  Father's  house.  Such  a  mediation 
doctrine  is  true  to  nature  and  history  and  himaan 
experience.  At-one-ment  is  often  brought  about 
by  the  intervention  of  a  third  person.  But  this  is 
not  traditional  orthodoxy,  which  claims  that  the 
only  available  mediation  between  sinful  man  and 
God  is  through  a  Divine  Person  who  becomes 
incarnate,  and  makes  atonement  for  sin  by  a  bloody 
death.  History  declares  such  a  view  to  be  essen- 
tially Pagan  and  Jewish  and  a  product  of  specula- 
tive thought,  not  of  historical  fact.     The  historical 


300        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

account  of  Christ's  death  contains  no  visible  ele- 
ment of  a  propitiatory  atoning  sacrifice.  He  was 
executed  as  a  criminal,  with  two  other  criminals, 
by  Roman  soldiers  at  the  command  of  a  Roman 
governor.  How  utterly  unhistorical  is  it  to  turn 
such  a  death  into  an  expiatory  sacrifice  for  human 
sin  to  satisfy  a  broken  law  or  propitiate  an 
offended  Deity !  Such  a  sacrifice  demands  an 
altar,  a  priest,  a  rite  of  worship,  as  in  the  story  of 
Abraham's  attempted  sacrifice  of  Isaac.  Of  course 
the  answer  of  the  defender  of  the  traditional  doc- 
trine is  that  under  the  veil  of  the  outward  history 
of  Christ's  death  there  is  a  revelation  of  God's 
method  of  redemption  of  man,  by  which  Christ's 
death  was  made  essential,  in  the  form  of  a  pro- 
pitiatory sacrifice.  But  history  shows  that  this 
whole  doctrine  of  a  substitutional  propitiatory  sac- 
rifice in  man's  behalf  in  order  to  satisfy  or  appease 
an  offended  or  angry  God,  or  to  enable  God  to 
exercise  and  manifest  his  disposition  of  love  and 
forgiveness,  is  not  the  teaching  of  Christ  himself, 
or  deducible  at  all  from  the  facts  of  his  death,  but 
part  of  a  historical  inheritance  from  primitive 
barbarous  times.  The  sacrificial  system  of  the 
Old  Testament  is  simply  an  illustration  of  prac- 
tices that  were  well-nigh  universal  in  the  ancient 
world.  The  theory  of  the  Jewish  sacrifices  was 
that  of  the  peoples  around  them,  viz.,  that  God 
needed  to  be  propitiated  by  bloody  offerings  in  order 
to  appease  his  anger  or  secure  his  favor.  The 
character  of  Jehovah,  as  indicated  by  the  Jewish 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      301 

sacrificial  rites,  was  like  tliat  of  a  human  being, 
subject  to  passion  and  affected  by  gifts.  Hence 
all  those  anthropomorphic  expressions  so  frequent 
in  the  Old  Testament,  in  which  God  is  described 
as  repenting,  becoming  angry,  etc.,  and  moved  by 
prayers.  All  this  anthropomorphism  is  a  relic  of 
the  primitive  religious  conceptions  of  the  race. 
Plato  in  the  "  Republic  "  quotes  from  some  earlier 
writer  a  saying  that  well  illustrates  this  anthropo- 
morphic view :  "  Gifts  persuade  the  gods,  and 
reverend  kings."  It  is  true  that  the  Hebrew  sys- 
tem of  sacrifices  put  into  prominence  the  sinfulness 
of  the  people,  and  thus  introduced  an  ethical  ele- 
ment that  was  fruitful  in  later  times.  But  a  like 
element  had  its  place  in  all  the  ethnic  religions 
and  sacrificial  cults.  What  made  the  gods  objects 
of  fear  in  part,  though  not  wholly,  was  the  sense 
of  sin  and  of  consequent  need  of  atonement  by 
way  of  substitutional  offerings.  The  sacrificial 
rites  in  all  the  religions  of  the  ancient  world  were 
the  direct  results  of  the  development  of  the  moral 
consciousness  of  men.  The  account  of  the  sacri- 
fices offered  by  Cain  and  Abel  in  the  beginning 
of  Genesis  shows  how  quickly  the  sacrificial  idea 
took  shape  in  the  traditions  of  the  human  race. 
It  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  facts  concern- 
ing Christ's  teaching  that  he  so  completely  spirit- 
ualized the  whole  Mosaic  law  of  sacrifice  and  thus 
showed  how  thoroughly  he  had  imbibed  the  spirit 
of  the  great  prophets  before  him.  As  we  have 
seen,  his  only  doctrine  of  sacrifice  was  that  of  a 


302        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

self-sacrificing  heart  wMcli  led  one  to  give  himself 
wholly  for  others.  But  Paul,  as  we  have  seen, 
feU  back  on  the  Jewish  sacrificial  tradition,  and 
he  was  followed  in  this  by  the  writer  of  the 
Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  Thus  it  is  plain  that  the 
Christian  dogma  of  the  atonement  is  a  direct  his- 
torical evolution  of  Jewish  and  Ethnic  sacrificial 
rites  and  ideas. 

As  to  the  moral  effect  of  such  ideas  and  rites, 
the  history  of  aU  religions  gives  terrible  and  con- 
clusive evidence.  Priucipal  Fairbairn,  in  his  recent 
address  before  the  International  Congregational 
Council  in  Boston  on  "  The  Influence  of  Other 
Religions  on  Christian  Theology,"  fresh  as  he  was 
from  the  study  of  the  ethnic  religions,  well  said : 
"  The  rites  of  appeasement  or  propitiation  are  in 
aU  religions  the  focus  of  the  forces  that  materialize 
and  deprave."  The  history  of  mankind  justifies 
this  statement ;  and  Dr.  Fairbairn  scarcely  needed 
to  add  :  "  This  is  no  rash  generalization  ;  it  is 
simple,  stern,  indubitable  fact."  I  would  say, 
further,  that  the  history  of  the  Christian  dogma  of 
the  atonement  forms  no  exception.  There  is  no 
dogma  of  Christian  theology  that  has  had  so  bane- 
ful an  influence  on  the  character  of  Christendom, 
or  that  has  led  to  such  terrible  results.  The  view 
of  God,  iQvolved  in  that  dogma,  as  a  Being  that 
was  propitiated  by  a  bloody  sacrifice,  that  de- 
lighted in  material  expiations  and  punishments, 
and  that  was  angry  and  revengeful  toward  the 
objects  of  his  displeasure,  had  the  effect  to  develop 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      303 

in  Christian  believers  the  same  traits  of  character. 
When  we  have  examined  the  pictures  of  God,  and 
even  of  Christ,  in  those  horrible  representations  of 
hell  and  of  the  torments  of  the  lost,  on  the  walls 
of  the  mediaeval  churches,  it  is  easy  to  understand 
how  Christians  could  persecute  each  other  so  cru- 
elly, and  believe  that  in  doiug  it  they  were  doing 
God  service. 

But  it  may  be  insisted  that  the  Christian  doc- 
trine of  the  atonement  differs  essentially  from  all 
previous  sacrificial  conceptions.  Dr.  Fairbairn 
seems  to  be  of  this  opinion,  for  he  proceeds  to 
draw  the  contrast  between  the  sacrifice  of  Christ 
and  all  other  sacrifices.  But  it  is  noticeable  that 
his  points  of  contrast  do  not  affect  the  radical 
relationship  of  the  Christian  dogma  to  ethnic 
sacrificial  ideas.  His  first  point  is  that  Christ's 
sacrifice  was  essentially  a  divine,  not  a  human 
sacrifice.  "  God  takes  it  out  of  the  hands  of  man 
and  offers  it  himself.  Its  qualities  are  all  ethi- 
cal, for  they  are  all  of  Him."  But  of  course  Dr. 
Fairbairn  holds  that  Christ's  sacrifice  was  made  in 
a  true  human  nature  and  through  a  true  human 
shedding  of  blood  and  death.  "  Its  qualities " 
then  were  not  "  aU  ethical,"  any  more  than  those 
of  other  human  or  material  sacrifices.  The  whole 
dogma  of  propitiatory  sacrifices  involves  and  neces- 
sitates a  material  element.  So  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews  declares  that  "without  the  shedding  of 
blood  there  is  no  remission,"  and  makes  the  con- 
trast between  the  Old  Testament  sacrifices  of  bulls 


304        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

and  goats  and  that  of  Christ  on  the  cross  to  con- 
sist in  this,  that  Christ  was  a  higher  being,  and 
therefore  a  more  precious  and  acceptable  offering 
to  God,  than  animals,  which  were  only  types  and 
symbols  of  the  true  sacrifice  on  Calvary.  The 
contrast  then  lies  in  the  character  of  the  victim, 
not  in  the  form  and  character  of  the  sacrifice, 
which  in  both  cases  requires  a  real  bloody  offering. 
Now  it  is  precisely  this  feature  of  the  necessity  of 
a  bloody  sacrifice,  involving  a  violent  death,  that 
makes  all  such  propitiatory  rites,  as  Dr.  Fairbairn 
himself  declares,  "the  focus  of  the  forces  that 
materiahze  and  deprave,"  and  it  is  this  very  fea- 
ture which  forms  the  essence  of  all  the  ethnic 
sacrifices  that  became  the  vital  characteristic  of 
the  orthodox  dogma  of  the  atonement.  According 
to  that  dogma  God  could  not  bring  about  a  recon- 
ciliation between  himself  and  mankind  without  a 
human  sacrifice  and  death  which  was  the  only  basis 
of  such  a  reconcihation.  It  was  also  equally  neces- 
sary that  the  victim  should  be  divine  as  well  as 
human.  Hence  the  incarnation  of  God  in  the 
person  of  his  Son,  who  entered  human  nature  by  a 
miraculous  birth  and  so  was  able  to  give  up  a  true 
human  life  on  the  cross  as  a  sacrificial  offering  for 
sin.  What  now  is  the  peculiarity  of  the  Christian 
dogma  as  compared  with  all  ethnic  ideas  ?  Simply 
this,  that  the  sacrifice  on  Calvary  was  precious 
beyond  all  comparison  with  any  sacrifice  of  a  mere 
human  being.  Christ's  death  was  both  a  human 
sacrifice  and  a  divine  sacrifice,  whereas  all  other 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      305 

sacrifices,  even  the  most  precious,  are  only  human. 
Is  then  the  radical  character  of  the  offering 
changed  ?  Not  at  aU.  That  view  which  rests  at 
the  bottom  of  those  degrading  human  sacrifices 
which  a  later  civilization  cast  away  is  also  the  very 
basis  of  the  old  Christian  orthodoxy. 

But  Dr.  Fairbairn  will  attempt  to  meet  this  by 
his  second  point  of  contrast,  viz.,  that  God  in 
Christ  offered  atonement  "  once  for  all."  "  It 
can  never  be  repeated:  man  can  never  share  in 
it."  But  if  Jesus  was  a  real  man,  certainly  man 
did  "  share  in  it "  once  at  least.  Of  course  Dr. 
Fairbairn  gets  this  point  from  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews.  If  Christ  was  God  himseK,  surely  no 
repetition  of  such  a  sacrifice  was  needed.  Is  this 
really  Dr.  Fairbairn's  own  christology  ?  However 
that  may  be,  the  fact  that  no  repetition  of  Christ's 
propitiatory  sacrifice  is  needed  does  not  at  all 
affect  the  question  as  to  the  character  of  the  one 
sacrifice  on  Calvary,  or  remove  it  from  its  histori- 
cal place  in  the  category  of  bloody  offerings.  Nor 
is  it  true  that  there  has  been  no  repetition  of 
Christ's  sacrifice  in  the  history  of  the  church 
dogma  of  atonement.  The  theory  of  a  repeated 
sacrifice  of  Christ  as  taking  place  whenever  the 
Lord's  Supper  was  celebrated  came  in  very  early 
in  Christian  faith,  and  culminated  in  the  dogma 
of  the  Mass,  in  which  it  was  believed  that  the  very 
body  and  blood  of  Christ  were  present  in  the  bread 
and  wine  and  sacrificed  afresh  for  the  saving  of 
souls.     It  required  the  Protestant  Reformation  to 


306        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

break  tLat  superstition,  and  that  movement  was 
only  partial,  and  how  many  Protestants  as  well  as 
Catholics  there  are  to-day  who  piously  believe  that 
in  some  supernatural  mystical  way  the  Lord's  Sup- 
per involves  a  true  repetition  of  the  one  sacrifice 
of  the  cross !  And  can  all  this  be  "  the  truth  as  it 
is  in  Jesus"?  How  clear  is  the  answer  of  history, 
and  also  of  the  moral  consciousness  of  mankind  ? 
The  simple  picture  of  the  death  of  Christ  is  indeed 
infinitely  tragic  and  pathetic,  and  it  has  made  him 
the  imique  martyr  of  history.  But  the  essence  of 
every  true  himian  martyrdom  is  the  same.  What 
then  is  the  secret  of  the  peculiar  tragicalness  of 
the  death  on  Calvary?  Not  surely  the  external 
circumstances  of  suffering,  pathetic  as  they  were. 
Such  dying  experiences  have  been  repeated  again 
and  again,  with  severer  and  more  prolonged  ago- 
nies. Christ  paid  the  debt  of  nature  as  all  of 
human  kind  have  done  or  must  do.  What  makes 
that  death  so  supremely  impressive  is  the  manner 
in  which  it  was  brought  about.  The  crucifixion 
on  Calvary  was  the  tragic  end  of  a  career  that  has 
moved  the  world's  heart  by  its  complete  devotion 
to  others  and  to  the  truth  of  God,  and  by  the  new 
gospel  of  divine  love  that  was  proclaimed  to  men, 
so  that  as  we  gaze  upon  the  cross  of  martyrdom, 
we  are  compelled  to  say :  "  No  man  ever  lived  or 
died  like  this  man."  The  spectacle  of  such  a  life 
and  death  draws  on  human  sympathy  and  love  and 
gratitude  as  nothing  else  can.  It  is  indeed  what 
Paul  declared  it  to  be,  "  the  power  of  God  unto 


THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  ATONEMENT      307 

salvation."  But  change  the  picture,  and  substi- 
tute for  it  the  picture  of  orthodox  tradition,  viz., 
of  a  divine  propitiation  offered  to  God  in  the  guise 
of  a  human  sacrificial  death,  and  how  irresistibly 
are  we  carried  back  to  the  rude  and  superstitious 
materialism  of  the  ancient  world,  from  which  man- 
kind has  been  slowly  rising  through  these  long 
centuries.  How  difficult  and  slow  the  moral  and 
religious  progress  of  the  world  has  been  history 
amply  illustrates.  Even  to-day  materialism  and 
superstition  are  large  factors  in  religious  faith. 
But  true  rehgion  is  a  purely  moral  condition  and 
experience.  At-one-ment  and  mediation  are  moral 
events.  They  belong  to  the  realm  of  spiritual 
realities,  not  to  the  order  of  material  things.  Blood- 
shedding  and  death  cannot  in  themselves  have  any 
moral  meaning.  It  was  Christ's  spirit  of  sacrifice, 
his  gift  of  himself,  that  made  his  death  on  the 
cross  an  event  of  the  highest  moral  significance. 
It  was  his  life  rather  than  his  death  that  has  given 
him  his  moral  supremacy  in  the  world.  Nor  did 
the  power  of  that  life  end  with  his  death.  His 
work  was  no  transient  spectacle,  but  one  that  has 
entered  vitaUy  and  permanently  into  human  his- 
tory, regenerating  and  sanctifying  it.  His  at-one- 
ment  and  mediation  in  their  most  blessed  forms 
are  going  on  still  in  the  persons  of  his  true  disci- 
ples of  every  age,  in  whom  his  spirit  is  exhibited, 
and  from  whom  it  flows  as  a  lifegiving  stream 
into  humanity. 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE  LEADING  FEATUKE8  AND  BENEFITS  OP  THE 
NEW  THEOLOGY 

We  have  tlius  sketched  a  few  of  the  lines  along 
which  the  new  theology  will  advance  towards  its 
historical  completion.  Further  it  is  not  permitted 
us  to  go.  But  looking  backward  over  the  way  we 
have  gone,  it  is  easy  to  see  what  the  leading  fea- 
tures of  the  new  theology  will  be,  and  what  special 
religious  benefits  it  will  confer  on  thinking  men. 
Firsts  it  wiU  serve  to  stay  the  pantheistic  current 
of  thought  that  now  threatens  to  engulf  us.  The 
real  conflict  to-day  is  not  between  the  Trinitarian 
and  the  Unitarian,  as  some  theologians  would  still 
have  us  believe,  but  between  the  Theist  and  the 
Pantheist.  Philosophical  monism  cannot  stop 
short  of  religious  pantheism.  Nor  can  the  reason, 
on  its  intellectual  side,  here  help  us.  Metaphysic 
only  plunges  us  the  more  deeply  into  the  abyss  we 
dread.  Witness  the  abortive  efforts  of  theological 
thinkers  who  walk  the  metaphysical  path  to  save 
themselves  from  the  pantheistic  consequences  of 
their  own  philosophical  premises.  Help  here  can 
come  only  from  man's  moral  consciousness.  That 
consciousness   intuitively  testifies   to   the    eternal 


BENEFITS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY     309 

reality  of  theism.  The  personal  soul  distinguishes 
itself  with  irresistible  energy  from  the  world 
around,  and  even  from  its  own  bodily  environ- 
ment. History,  which  gathers  up  the  total  individ- 
ual experience  of  the  human  race,  speaks  in  clear 
tones  for  the  theistic  doctrine,  and  it  is  history 
that  forms  the  bone  and  sinew  of  the  new  theology. 
It  will  be  more  fully  recognized  some  day  what  a 
blessing  history  has  wrought  for  this  age,  in  break- 
ing the  reign  of  metaphysic,  and  dissolving  the 
pantheistic  mists  and  vapors  that  have  gathered 
around  it,  as  about  some  mountain  peak. 

Secondly^  the  new  theology  will  also  help  to 
stay  the  tide  of  materialism  which  is  setting  so 
strongly,  and  to  build  the  foundation  of  a  true 
spiritual  philosophy.  Materialism  is  only  another 
phase  of  monistic  pantheism,  but  deserves  special 
consideration.  If  monism  be  scientifically  and 
philosophically  accepted,  there  can  be  but  one 
result,  resist  it  as  you  wiU.  If  there  is  but  one 
original  substance  in  the  universe,  and  that  either 
mind  or  matter,  and  mind  is  evolved  from  matter 
or  matter  from  mind,  if,  I  say,  one  horn  of  this 
dilemma  must  be  chosen,  there  is  no  doubt  what 
the  choice  must  be.  The  universal  law  of  scien- 
tific and  historic  evolution  is  ever  from  lower  to 
higher,  from  matter  to  mind,  and  materialism  is 
our  only  refuge.  But  here  again  man's  moral 
consciousness  utters  its  fixed  ineradicable  protest 
against  such  a  philosophical  result.  It  declares 
itself  not  only  individual  and  personal,  but,  in 


310        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

doing  this,  also  declares  itself  a  spiritual,  and  not 
a  material,  being.  Theism  is  spiritualism;  pan- 
theism is  bound  to  be  materialism  at  last.  The 
new  theology  wiU  stand  on  the  affirmations  of 
man's  moral  consciousness,  and  of  history  which  is 
its  great  interpreter.  In  doing  this,  it  takes  issue 
not  only  with  philosophic  monism  in  any  of  its 
forms,  but  also  with  the  inherent  tendencies  of  the 
old  theology,  which  has  always  reduced  to  a  mini- 
mum the  spiritual  elements  of  religion.  A  cursory 
glance  at  it  shows  at  once  what  a  thoroughly 
materialistic  shaping  is  given  to  most  of  its  dog- 
mas. Its  doctrine  of  God  is  materialistic,  making 
Him  a  God  of  wrath  and  vengeance  and  readiness 
to  inflict  material  suffering  on  the  objects  of  his 
displeasure.  Its  doctrine  of  man  and  of  sin  is 
materialistic,  treating  sin  as  a  hereditary  taint  of 
fallen  human  nature,  in  which  all  the  descendants 
of  Adam  are  involved.  So  with  its  doctrine  of 
atonement,  which  is  accomplished  by  a  human- 
divine  sacrifice  to  propitiate  an  offended  God. 
And  so  with  its  eschatological  doctrines,  —  the 
personal  second  coming  of  Christ  in  the  clouds  of 
heaven,  the  bodily  resurrection  of  mankind,  a 
local  material  heaven  and  hell.  If  any  one  doubts 
this,  let  him  read  a  few  of  the  sermons  of  John 
Wesley  and  of  Jonathan  Edwards.  By  such  terri- 
ble descriptions  of  God's  dealings  with  sinners  the 
moral  sense  is  shocked,  and  cries  out  against  them. 
All  these  materialistic  forms  of  dogma  the  new 
theology  dismisses  at  once.     They  are  wholly  in- 


BENEFITS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY     311 

consistent  with  the  moral  character  of  God,  as 
revealed  in  man's  own  moral  consciousness,  and 
with  the  moral  laws  which  govern  his  kingdom. 

Thirdly^  the  new  theology  will  draw  the  line 
sharply  between  faith  as  a  religious  act  and  be- 
lief as  an  intellectual  act  The  day  when  creeds 
are  treated  as  articles  and  expressions  of  religious 
faith  is  passing  by.  The  idea  so  deeply  rooted  in 
the  old  theology  that  there  is  salvation  in  a  creed 
received  its  death-blow  when  the  history  of  the 
creeds  of  the  church  and  of  the  manner  of  their 
formation  was  truly  written.  The  law  of  historical 
evolution  has  also  destroyed  the  closely  allied  idea 
that  the  church  of  the  early  centuries  was  compe- 
tent to  decide  and  fix  the  dogmas  of  religious 
belief  for  all  time.  Do  we  go  to  the  third  and 
fourth  centuries  of  the  Christian  era  for  our  sci- 
ence, our  astronomy,  our  geology,  our  philosophy, 
our  history?  Why  then  should  we  go  to  them 
for  our  religious  dogmas  ?  The  ancient  creeds  are 
like  the  fossiliferous  strata  of  the  earth's  surface, 
which  contain  rather  the  records  of  decay  and 
death  than  living  beings.  A  creed  is  mostly  a  like 
record  of  dead  issues,  not  a  living  gospel.  Hence 
the  new  theology  must  reject  all  creeds  as  religious 
tests,  and  can  accept  them  only  as  historical  testi- 
monials of  the  religious  beliefs  of  earlier  times. 
It  sharply  distinguishes  religious  faith  from  reli- 
gious knowledge,  love  for  Christ  and  truth  from 
opinions  about  Christ  and  truth.  Its  only  reli- 
gious Credo  is  one  of  the  heart,  not  of  the  specu- 


812        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

lative  reason,  and  Paul's  words  would  well  state  it : 
"  But  now  abideth  faith,  hope,  love,  these  three, 
and  the  greatest  of  these  is  love."  In  the  new 
theology  the  old  unadjusted  antagonism  between 
faith  and  reason  ceases  forever. 

It  is  pleasant,  as  we  conclude  this  chapter,  to 
turn  away  from  the  past,  and  catch  a  glimpse  of 
what  is  to  come.  For  there  is  surely  a  bright 
future  for  theology  as  a  science  of  religion.  Like 
other  sciences  it  must  ever  remain  incomplete, 
even  more  so  than  its  sisters,  because  its  mate- 
rials are  less  available  and  less  easily  concatenated 
into  systematic  form,  and  because  new  materials 
from  larger  horizons  are  continually  being  added. 
But  when  whoUy  freed  from  its  traditional  fetters 
and  based  on  the  inductive  method,  it  will  be- 
come the  noblest  department  of  philosophy.  For 
philosophy  theology  essentially  is.  Examine  any 
history  of  philosophy,  and  see  how  intertwined 
the  two  terms  are.  Philosophy  may  be  the  more 
extensive  of  the  two,  if  theology  is  limited  to  the 
more  specific  doctrine  of  Grod.  But  if  anthro- 
pology and  the  doctrine  of  creation  be  included  in 
theology,  as  they  usually  are,  what  radical  differ- 
ence is  there  between  them?  For  nature,  man, 
and  God  exhaust  the  materials  of  philosophy  as 
well  as  theology.  There  is  no  object  of  thought 
beyond.  Practically,  however,  philosophy  deals 
more  with  speculative  metaphysics,  and  theology 
more  with  vital  Christian  beliefs.  But  theology 
may  become  as  speculative  as  philosophy,  and  this 


BENEFITS  OF  THE  NEW  THEOLOGY     313 

was  true  in  fact  all  tkrough  the  dogmatic  period 
of  Christian  history.  But  when  the  dogmatic  yoke 
has  been  completely  broken,  and  theology  shall 
have  found  its  true  place  as  a  form  of  philosophic 
thought,  its  golden  age  will  begin.  Even  in  the 
past,  in  spite  of  persecution  and  dogmatic  bitter- 
ness, human  thought  has  achieved  noble  results  in 
its  efforts  to  find  the  secret  of  the  universe,  of 
man,  and  of  God.  Such  illustrious  thinkers  as 
Socrates,  Plato,  Ai'istotle,  Origen,  Plotinus,  Atha- 
nasius,  Augustine,  John  Scotus  Erigena,  Abelard, 
Francis  Bacon,  are  immortal.  What  names  the 
future  has  in  store  its  unrolling  scroll  of  history 
only  will  tell.  But  that  they  will  be  even  greater 
and  more  illustrious  we  are  as  sure  as  that  light 
and  knowledge  wiU  increase  with  more  and  more 
rapid  strides,  and  that  philosophy  will  attain  more 
and  more  of  grasp  and  certainty. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

CONCLUSION 

The  historical  situation,  as  thus  surveyed,  leaves 
us  on  the  verge  of  a  limitless  future  of  progress 
toward  still  higher  and  better  historical  results. 
History  itself,  we  are  coming  to  see,  is  perhaps, 
beyond  all  other  modes  of  divine  revelation,  the 
grand  interpreter  of  God  and  his  ways  with  man. 
And  as  its  principles  and  processes  are  better 
understood,  and  its  spirit  of  prophecy  gets  surer 
footing,  the  outlook  to  the  historical  observer  be- 
comes more  and  more  realistic  and  inspiring.  How 
vast  and  wonderful  is  the  outlook  to-day  compared 
with  that  of  ancient  or  even  mediaeval  times  I 
How  contracted  their  view  of  nature  and  its  phe- 
nomena as  compared  with  ours  I  What  worlds 
upon  worlds  have  come  within  our  gaze  into  the 
heavens  of  which  they  never  even  dreamed !  Just 
so  with  our  historical  outlook  as  compared  with 
theirs.  For  them  no  law  of  evolution  explained, 
as  it  does  for  us,  the  intimate  relations  of  the  past 
and  the  future  so  clearly  that  they  could  become 
true  seers  of  events  still  far  off  and  invisible. 
Pessimism  is  a  false  note  of  the  historic  spirit. 
Progress  in  ever-ascending  stages  is  the  last  word 


CONCLUSION  315 

of  historical  as  well  as  scientific  evolution.  There 
may  be  reactions  and  revolutions,  but  they  are 
only  the  convulsions  that  are  needed  to  prepare 
the  way  for  new  eras  of  higher  and  fuller  life. 
The  final  cause  and  end  is  good,  and  step  by  step 
that  end  is  kept  in  view.  The  seed  is  before  the 
plant,  the  bud  before  the  flower,  the  instinct  of 
the  brute  before  the  reason  of  man,  man  himseK 
before  the  angels.  But  that  man  shall  "  be  as  the 
angels  "  is  the  final  end.  What  heights  of  intel- 
lectual and  moral  life  have  been  reached  that  to 
the  early  savage  were  utterly  inconceivable !  But 
humanity  is  not  yet  at  the  end  of  its  career.  The 
evolution  must  go  on.  There  is  no  room  for  pes- 
simism in  such  a  view.  The  real  pessimists  of 
to-day  are  those  who  cling  to  the  past  with  all  its 
unhistorical  and  traditional  rubbish,  and  bewail 
the  resistless  advance  of  the  critical  Time  Spirit. 
No  wonder  there  are  birds  of  ill  omen  in  the  air. 
For  coming  historical  events  are  casting  their 
shadows  before,  and  the  handwriting  on  the  wall 
can  already  be  read  by  any  clear-sighted  observer. 
That  handwriting  is  the  voice  of  history  itself.  It 
pronounces  the  doom  of  what  is  "  old  and  ready  to 
vanish  away,"  but  it  also  heralds  a  new  dispen- 
sation of  God's  eternally  fresh  and  progressive 
revelation  of  truth.  History,  indeed,  is  our  true 
idealist.  Its  idealism,  however,  is  not  that  of  a 
Platonic  or  Hegelian  metaphysic,  but  that  of  a 
historical  Baconian  induction. 

But  while  historical  methods  and  studies  are 


316        EVOLUTION  OF  TRINITARIANISM 

thus  optimistic  and  idealistic  in  their  entire  out- 
look, the  historical  scholar  cannot  hide  from  his 
view  the  fact  that  such  a  mighty  revolution  as  we 
have  been  surveying  is  fraught  with  momentous 
trials  and  perils  both  intellectual  and  religious. 
As  political  revolutions  involve  temporary  civil 
and  social  disorders,  and  even  ruin  to  many  indi- 
viduals, although  their  occurrence  is  a  necessity 
and  their  results  are  beneficent,  so  must  it  always 
be  with  intellectual  and  moral  revolutions.  When 
one  realizes  that  this  age  is  passing  through  the 
most  radical  revolution  that  the  intellectual  his- 
tory of  the  race  has  ever  recorded,  it  is  idle  to 
expect  that  it  can  be  accomplished  without  tragic 
accompaniments  of  individual  mental  and  moral 
suffering.  Surely  the  divine  revelations  in  history 
are  often  sharp  and  bitter  teachers.  We  are  liv- 
ing in  times  when  many  "  men's  hearts  are  failing 
for  fear  "  of  what  impends.  Nothing  is  so  timid 
as  theological  tradition.  It  requires  a  serene  and 
courageous  soul  to  stand  firm  and  undaunted  in 
the  midst  of  a  death  struggle  between  the  powers 
of  a  venerated  tradition  that  has  held  unbroken 
sway  over  the  minds  and  consciences  of  men  for 
nearly  two  thousand  years,  and  the  powers  of  the 
Zeitgeist^  armed  with  its  fatal  weapons  of  history 
and  science  and  criticism.  Christ  prophesied  of 
such  a  time  as  anticipating  his  own  spiritual  ad- 
vent, and  added  the  needed  exhortation,  "  In  pa- 
tience possess  your  souls."  Courage  and  patience 
are  indeed  the  watchwords  of  the  hour.     God  is 


CONCLUSION  317 

working  out  his  own  purposes.  It  is  for  man  to 
"  be  still."  In  all  the  present  stress  and  tumult 
of  destructive  and  reconstructive  forces,  we  may 
hear  above  the  din  of  human  voices  the  "  stiU 
small  voice"  of  the  divine  providence,  repeating 
its  word  of  nineteen  centuries  ago,  and  saying  once 
more :  "  Behold^  I  make  all  things  new^ 


APPENDIX 

A.    THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM 

A  HISTORICAL  investigation  of  the  question  whether 
the  Apostle  John  wrote  the  fourth  Gospel  naturally 
falls  under  three  distinct  heads. 

I.  What  are  the  historically  accredited  facts  concern- 
ing John  ? 

n.  What  is  the  character  of  the  fourth  Gospel  as 
compared  with  the  Synoptic  gospels,  and  what  is  the 
earliest  date  of  its  appearance  in  history  ? 

III.  When  and  how  did  the  tradition  that  John  was 
its  author  come  into  vogue  ? 

I.  The  historical  facts  concerning  John.  In  the 
Synoptic  gospels  John  appears  as  one  of  the  original 
Galilean  disciples.  He  was  the  son  of  a  fisherman  and 
himself  followed  that  calling  when  Jesus  invited  him 
to  enter  his  service.  Like  the  other  Galilean  disciples 
he  was  "  unlearned,"  which  means  that  he  had  no  rab- 
binic or  Greek  culture.  His  vernacular  was  Galilean 
Aramaic,  —  a  dialect  distinguished  for  its  barbaric  pro- 
vincialisms, —  Galilee  being  a  comparatively  uncultured 
district.  It  was  this  which  led  to  the  amazement  of  the 
Jews  at  Jerusalem  when  Jesus,  who  had  been  reared  in 
Nazareth,  appeared  as  a  teacher  and  showed  himself 
able  to  meet  the  rabbis  on  their  own  ground.  The 
same  surprise  was  shown  by  the  Jewish  Sanhedrim,  on 
hearing  the  defense  of  Peter  and  John,  "perceiving 
that  they  were  unlearned  and  ignorant  men/'  and  their 


320  APPENDIX 

explanation  of  the  marvel  was  the  natural  one,  "  that 
they  had  been  with  Jesus."  There  is  no  evidence  that 
Jesus  himself  or  any  of  his  Galilean  disciples  had  any 
education  beyond  that  which  had  been  gained  in  the 
peasant  surroundings  of  their  childhood  and  youth. 
The  great  objection  continually  employed  by  the  reli- 
gious teachers  and  leaders  of  the  Jews  against  Christ  was 
that  he  assumed  to  teach  without  having  passed  through 
their  rabbinical  schools.  He  did  not  teach  "  as  the 
scribes."  The  same  objection  applied  equally  to  his 
disciples.  They  were  "  unlearned  men "  and  hence 
unfitted  to  teach.  It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that 
there  is  no  hint  in  the  gospel  records  that  either  Jesus 
or  any  of  his  original  Galilean  disciples  committed  his 
teachings  to  writing.  The  first  Epistle  of  Peter,  if 
genuine,  is  the  only  really  authentic  written  document 
that  has  come  down  from  their  hands.  Christ  and  his 
disciples  were  intent  on  the  oral  proclamation  of  the 
gospel.  The  reduction  of  that  gospel  to  a  written  form 
was  to  be  the  work  of  a  time  when  the  original  wit- 
nesses of  Christ's  ministry  were  passing  away,  and 
when  the  spread  of  the  gospel  beyond  Palestine  and 
the  increased  number  of  churches  made  it  expedient. 

It  is  remarkable,  in  view  of  the  later  reputation  of 
John,  how  small  a  part  he  plays  in  the  New  Testament 
narratives.  He  is  always  secondary  to  his  brother 
James,  and,  in  the  trio  of  Peter,  James,  and  John,  he  is 
usually  last.  There  is  no  hint  in  the  Synoptic  gospels 
of  any  peculiar  intimacy  between  John  and  Christ. 
Remarkable,  too,  is  the  fact  that  John  never  is  intro- 
duced as  a  speaker.  There  is  not  a  saying  of  his  re- 
corded. On  the  two  only  occasions  in  which  he  spe- 
cially figures,  his  brother  James  is  joined  with  him,  and, 
as  James's  name  is  first,  the  natural  inference  is  that 
he  was  the  chief  mover  in  both  affairs.     It  is  also  not- 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  321 

able  that  both  occasions  reveal  defects  of  disposition  and 
character  which  called  forth  from  Christ  the  language 
of  disapproval  and  even  of  rebuke.  Their  sensualistic 
view  of  the  Messianic  kingdom  and  their  own  personal 
ambitions  were  exhibited  in  their  request,  made  through 
their  mother,  that  they  might  sit  nearest  to  Christ  in 
his  kingdom.  Christ's  answer  was  :  "  Ye  know  not 
what  ye  ask."  In  the  second  instance  their  carnal 
anger  against  the  Samaritans  led  them  to  ask  permis- 
sion to  call  down  fire  from  heaven  to  consume  them. 
But  "  Christ  turned  and  rebuked  them."  Very  far  was 
John  then  from  that  mellowed  sanctification  which 
caused  him  in  post-apostolic  tradition  to  be  known  as  the 
Apostle  of  Love.  Passing  to  the  Book  of  Acts,  John's 
name  appears  in  the  list  of  disciples  who  awaited  the 
day  of  Pentecost.  A  few  days  after  he  is  joined  with 
Peter  in  the  affair  which  resulted  in  their  appearance 
before  the  Sanhedrim,  when  Peter  is  the  chief  speaker. 
But  from  this  early  point  in  the  narrative  he  disappears 
from  the  scene.  After  this,  other  disciples,  such  as 
Peter,  Phihp,  James,  and  especially  Paul,  occupy  the 
stage,  but  John  is  not  once  mentioned.  At  the  gath- 
ering in  Jerusalem,  recorded  in  the  fifteenth  chapter, 
where  all  the  leaders  of  the  church  were  assembled, 
there  is  a  significant  silence  concerning  him.  Paul  in- 
deed refers  to  him,  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Galatians,  as 
being  at  Jerusalem  about  this  time,  but  this  is  the  last 
clear  glimpse  of  him  in  authentic  apostolic  history. 
The  rest  of  his  Ufe  is  left  entirely  in  shadow,  and  the 
place  and  date  of  his  death  are  unrecorded.  It  is  not- 
able that  Paul  in  his  later  epistles  makes  no  further 
allusion  to  him.  A  recently  discovered  fragment  of 
Papias  preserved  in  excerpts  from  the  "  Church  His- 
tory "  of  Philip  Sidetes,  if  authentic,  as  it  seems  to  be, 
gives  us  what  may  be  regarded  as  the  most  natural  and 


322  APPENDIX 

probable  account  of  the  manner  of  his  death  :  "  Papias 
in  his  second  book  says  that  John  the  divine  and  James 
his  brother  were  slain  by  the  Jews."  This  would 
accord  with  the  words  of  Christ  as  given  in  Mark,  in 
answer  to  the  request  of  the  two  brothers  that  they 
might  sit  one  on  his  right  hand  and  one  on  his  left 
in  his  kingdom :  "  The  cup  that  I  drink  ye  shall 
drink,  and  with  the  baptism  that  I  am  baptized  withal 
shall  ye  be  baptized  :  "  which  plainly  implies  that  they 
both  would  die  a  martyr's  death,  and  certainly  this 
must  have  been  the  tradition  when  the  present  Mark 
was  written  or  edited.  The  Acts  informs  us  that 
"James  the  brother  of  John"  was  put  to  death  by 
Herod,  and  that  "  when  he  saw  that  it  pleased  the  Jews 
he  proceeded  to  seize  Peter  also."  It  may  be  that 
John  too  fell  a  victim  to  Herod's  desire  to  please  the 
Jews,  and  that  the  tradition  in  the  form  related  by 
Papias  may  be  thus  explained.  There  is  a  Syriac  mar- 
tyrology,  also,  that  unites  James  and  John  as  martyrs. 
The  change  from  the  comparative  reticence  of  the 
New  Testament  concerning  John  to  the  mass  of  tradi- 
tions which  gathered  around  his  name  in  subsequent 
years  is  truly  marvelous.  He  became  the  centre  of  a 
legendary  growth  which  far  surpasses  that  which  was 
formed  around  any  other  apostolic  personage  except 
Christ  himself.  What  were  the  precise  causes  of  such 
a  growth  it  is  vain  to  seek,  in  an  age  when  the  histor- 
ical critical  spirit  was  still  unborn,  and  when  all  his- 
torical and  biographical  events  speedily  became  mingled 
with  legendary  additions.  There  were  indeed  special 
reasons  why  the  early  Christians  should  have  been 
easily  led  to  accept  for  truth  the  legendary  stories  that 
rapidly  grew  up  concerning  Christ  and  his  immediate 
disciples.  Christianity  had  its  very  birth  in  the  air  of 
marvel'  and  miracle.     Messianism   prepared   men   for 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  323 

the  expectation  of  immediate  wonderful  events.  Jesus 
himself,  as  the  Christ,  quickly  became  the  centre  of  a 
whole  legendary  cycle  in  which,  as  we  have  seen,  his 
mother  Mary  played  a  prominent  part.  The  same  was 
true  of  the  original  Apostles.  In  the  Acts  they  are  still 
in  Judea  and  Galilee  and  the  immediate  vicinity  preach- 
ing the  gospel  in  the  only  language  with  which  they 
were  acquainted.  Paul  gives  no  hint  in  his  epistles 
that  any  of  them  went  far  from  Palestine.  When  he 
met  the  three  "  who  seemed  to  be  pillars,"  "  James, 
Peter,  and  John,"  at  Jerusalem,  it  was  arranged  be- 
tween them  that  Paul  and  Barnabas  should  go  to  the 
Grentiles  and  "  they  unto  the  circumcision."  Thus  Paul 
became  a  foreign  missionary,  while  the  Galilean  disci- 
ples remained  at  home  among  their  own  Jewish  people. 
The  only  exception  is  Peter's  visit  to  Antioch,  and 
afterwards  to  Babylon,  among  the  Jews  of  the  disper- 
sion, according  to  the  natural  interpretation  of  the 
closing  verses  of  the  first  Epistle  of  Peter,  if  that  Epis- 
tle be  genuine. 

But  when  the  historical  ground  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment is  left,  the  whole  scene  changes.  Later  tradition 
sends  them  into  all  parts  of  the  known  world,  Thomas 
to  Parthia  and  India,  Andrew  to  Scythia,  Bartholomew 
to  Arabia,  Thaddeus  to  Edessa,  Matthew  to  Ethiopia, 
James  to  Spain,  Peter  to  Rome.  So  John  is  sent  to 
Ephesus,  where  he  lives  to  a  great  age,  becoming  the 
centre  of  a  Johannine  circle  or  school  and  writing  the 
Gospel  which  has  made  him  the  most  famous  apostle 
after  Paul  himself.  It  was  once  the  custom  to  accept 
many  of  these  legends  as  containing  substantial  truth, 
but  such  acceptance  is  no  longer  possible.  Critical 
scholarship  has  completely  destroyed  their  historical 
credibility  and  has  transferred  them,  almost  if  not 
quite  en  masse,  to   the  realm  of   fable.     It   is  not   a 


324  APPENDIX 

grateful  task  to  play  the  part  of  iconoclast  with  so 
many  creations  of  Christian  fancy  and  devotion.  But 
here  the  plain  truth  must  be  told.  As  soon  as  the  his- 
torical inquirer  has  stepped  off  the  historical  ground  of 
the  New  Testament  and  entered  the  post-apostolic  age, 
he  finds  it  impossible  to  retain  any  secure  historical 
footing  concerning  John  or  his  fellow  disciples.  When 
at  length,  a  hundred  years  or  so  after  the  close  of  the 
Acts,  he  first  meets  with  the  traditions  that  begin  to 
gather,  it  is  true  that  they  rapidly  increase  in  number 
and  also  in  wonderfulness,  and  reach  a  widespread 
unanimity,  but  the  fatal  defect  with  them  aU  is  that  no 
clear  historical  nexus  can  be  found  which  may  connect 
them  with  the  historical  ground  that  has  been  left 
behind.  Not  only  is  there  a  gap  of  a  century,  but  the 
traditions  themselves  bear  the  clear  marks  of  legend, 
and  these  marks  grow  clearer  and  clearer  as  the  evolu- 
tion goes  on,  until  at  last  all  trace  of  anything  historical 
is  lost  in  romance  and  miracle.  It  may  be  expected 
that  historical  criticism  should  distinguish  between  what 
is  historical  and  what  is  legendary.  But  this  will  be 
found  impossible.  Professor  Plumptre,  the  writer  of 
the  article  on  John  in  Smith's  Bible  Dictionary,  truly 
says :  "  The  picture  which  tradition  fiUs  up  for  us  has 
the  merit  of  being  full  and  vivid,  but  it  blends  together, 
without  much  regard  to  harmony,  things  probable  and 
improbable."  What  can  the  historical  critic  do  with 
the  story  which  Tertullian  records  as  historical  fact 
concerning  John's  being  plunged  unhurt  at  Rome  into 
boiling  oil,  and  afterwards  being  sent  into  exile  ;  or  the 
relation  of  Apollonius,  given  by  Eusebius,  without  a 
hint  against  its  veracity,  that  "  a  dead  man  was  raised 
to  life  by  the  divine  power  through  John  at  Ephesus," 
or  the  "  current  report "  recorded  by  Augustine  as 
"  found  in  certain  apocryphal  scriptures  "  "  that  John, 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  325 

when  in  good  health,  ordered  a  sepulchre  to  be  made 
for  him,  and  that  when  it  was  dug  and  prepared  with 
all  possible  care,  he  laid  himself  down  there  as  in  a  bed, 
and  became  immediately  defunct,  yet  not  really  defunct, 
and  while  accounted  dead  was  actually  buried  while 
asleep,  and  that  he  will  so  remain  till  the  coming  of 
Christ,  the  fact  of  his  continued  life  being  made  known 
by  the  bubbling  up  of  the  dust,  caused  by  the  breathing 
of  the  sleeper."  Augustine  does  not  decide  as  to  the 
truth  of  this  report,  but  informs  us  that  he  "  has  heard 
it  from  those  who  were  not  altogether  unreliable  wit- 
nesses." This  wonderful  story  reaches  its  climax  in  a 
Greek  ecclesiastical  historian  of  the  fourteenth  century, 
in  the  addition  that  "  when  the  tomb  was  subsequently 
opened  it  was  found  empty  " !  I  have  selected  these 
items  especially  because  they  are  vouched  for  by  such 
writers  as  Tertullian,  Eusebius,  and  Augustine.  The 
verdict  of  Professor  Plumptre  is  the  only  one  that  can 
be  accepted  by  historical  criticism,  viz.,  that  "  these 
traditions,  for  the  most  part,  indicate  little  else  than 
the  uncritical  character  of  the  age  in  which  they  passed 
current."  It  may  still  be  urged  that  the  wheat  of  his- 
torical truth  ought  to  be  sifted  out  of  this  mass  of  legen- 
dary chaff.  But  Professor  Plumptre  well  says :  "  We 
strain  our  sight  in  vain  to  distinguish  between  the  false 
and  the  true,  between  the  shadows  with  which  the  gloom 
is  peopled  and  the  living  forms  of  which  we  are  in 
search."  The  defender  of  tradition  may  fall  back  on 
the  position  that  all  historical  traditions,  though  they 
gather  legendary  accretions  with  years,  yet  always  have 
a  historical  substratum,  and  that  it  is  the  function  of 
criticism  to  separate  the  real  facts  from  such  legendary 
accretions.  The  implied  premise  on  which  this  assump- 
tion rests  is  that  a  legend  never  grows  without  a  his- 
torical nucleus  as  its  root ;  but  this  cannot  be  allowed. 


326  APPENDIX 

History  furnishes  not  a  few  examples  of  such  legends.^ 
It  may  be  claimed  that  the  events  recorded  in  the  New 
Testament  concerning  the  Apostles  are  the  nuclei  of  the 
later  traditions,  and  that  if  the  New  Testament  accounts 
are  accepted  as  historical,  the  later  ones  cannot  be 
treated  as  wholly  legendary.  But  the  difference  between 
the  New  Testament  narratives  and  the  post-apostolic 
traditions  is  radical.  In  the  Synoptic  gospels,  the  Acts, 
and  Paul's  epistles,  we  are  at  least  on  historical  ground. 
Jesus  and  his  chief  disciples  and  Paul  are  historical 
characters  as  indubitably  as  Augustus  or  Herod.  That 
legend  crept  into  the  New  Testament  narrative  is  no 
more  surprising  than  that  it  should  have  filled  the  open- 
ing pages  of  Livy,  or  disfigured  the  gossiping  bio- 
graphies of  Suetonius.  Here  the  task  of  the  critic  is 
plain,  viz.,  to  separate  as  far  as  possible  the  historical 
truth  from  unhistorical  legend,  —  a  work  now  going 
on,  though  not  yet  completed.  But  the  case  with  post- 
apostolic  legendary  tradition  is  entirely  different.  Here 
there  is  wanting  the  very  basis  of  history  itself.  There 
is  no  clear  historical  ground  on  which  the  critic  can 
work. 

Take,  for  example,  the  case  of  Peter.     He  disap- 

1  A  good  illustration  is  the  legend  of  St,  Christopher  which 
had  such  a  wonderful  jwpularity  through  the  Middle  Ages,  and 
was  made  the  subject  of  such  poetic  and  artistic  elaboration. 
This  legend  has  recently  been  critically  investigated  by  a  Ger- 
man scholar,  and  his  work  is  reviewed  in  the  last  number  (No- 
vember^ December,  1899)  of  the  Revue  de  VHistoire  des  Religions. 
The  reviewer  concludes,  in  full  agreement  with  the  author,  that 
the  legend  rests  on  "  no  initial  historical  fact,"  and  must  be  re- 
garded as  "  only  the  fruit  of  pure  religious  imagination."  "  The 
giant  Christopher  is  mythical ;  we  can  affirm  no  more."  Yet  St. 
Christopher  has  a  special  day  set  for  him  in  the  Calendar  of  the 
Greek  and  Latin  churches  (May  6,  July  25),  as  if  he  were  a  his- 
torical person. 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  327 

pears  from   authentic   history  about  A.  d.  60.     Some 
years  later,  we  know  not  how  many,  he  may  have  gone 
to  Babylon  to  preach  the  gospel  to  his  Jewish  country- 
men sojourning  there  in  large  numbers.     This  is  the 
end  of  our  historical  knowledge.     Tradition  more  than 
a  generation  after   begins  by  alluding   to  Peter  as  a 
martyr.     We  wait  for  the  next  step  of  evolution  nearly 
a  hundred  years,  when  his  martyrdom  is  made  to  occur 
at  Rome.     From  this  point  the  tradition  grows  more 
and  more  widespread  and  unanimous.     In   the   third 
century  the  manner  of  his  death  is  added,  viz.,  crucifix- 
ion, and  then  the  crowning  touch  is  given,  that,  at  his 
own  request,  he  was  crucified  with  his  head  downward. 
From  this  point  tradition  branches  out  into  the  varied 
forms  of  which  perhaps  the  legend  found  in  Ambrose  is 
most  touching  :  that,  when  persuaded  by  his  friends  to 
flee  from  the  death  that  threatened  him,  he  met  Christ 
at   the  gate  of   the  city,  who,  on  Peter's  asking   him 
whither  he  was  going,  replied :    "  I  go  to  Rome  once 
more   to  be  crucified."     This  rebuke  revived   Peter's 
courage  and  he  returned  to  his  death.     To  this  account 
it  should  be  added  that  by  the  beginning  of  the  third 
century  it  was   believed   that   Peter's   tomb  could  be 
shown    in    Rome.     The    further   tradition   which   the 
Roman  church  started,  making  Peter  the  founder  and 
first  bishop  of  that  church,  on  which  was    afterwards 
built  the  papal  claim  of  supreme  ecclesiastical  author- 
ity, I  need  not  dweU  on. 

Now  the  only  real  historical  basis  of  all  this  legen- 
dary growth  is  simply  the  account  in  the  Acts  of  Peter's 
meeting  with  Simon  Magus  in  Samaria.  This  meeting 
was  made  the  foundation  of  the  legendary  romance  of 
the  Clementine  Homilies  in  which  Peter  is  made  to  fol- 
low Simon  through  Syria  and  finally  to  Rome.  This 
romance  is  full  of  the  most  flagrant  distortions  of  his- 


328  APPENDIX 

torical  fact,  —  Peter  being  made  to  descend  to  the  lowest 
arts  of  magic  and  miracle.  But  how  should  this  purely 
legendary  meeting  between  Peter  and  Simon  have  been 
accepted  by  the  early  church  as  historical  ?  The  story 
is  a  curious  one.  The  basis  of  it  is  found  in  Justin 
Martyr  about  the  middle  of  the  second  century.  He 
lived  for  a  considerable  period  at  Rome.  There  he  saw 
a  statue,  in  an  island  of  the  Tiber,  dedicated  to  Semo 
Sancus,  a  Sabine  divinity.  The  name  was  plainly  con- 
founded by  Justin  with  that  of  Simon  the  magician  of 
the  Acts,  whose  fame  was  spread  in  Samaria,  where 
Justin  was  born.  Hence  in  his  Apology,  which  he 
wrote  at  Rome  to  the  Emperor,  he  referred  to  Simon  as 
having  visited  Rome  and  been  honored  with  a  statue 
bearing  the  inscription  Simoni  Deo  Sancto,  It  was  on 
such  a  plain  mistake  that  was  raised  one  of  the  most 
colossal  legends  that  was  ever  fabricated.  But  Justin 
made  no  allusion  to  Peter.  Neither  did  Irenaeus,  who 
continued  the  Simon  Magus  tradition,  apparently  mak- 
ing Justin  his  authority,  yet  connect  Peter  with  it.  But 
the  germ  in  the  Acts  could  not  fail  finally  of  coming  to 
fruitage.  Passing  by  the  Clementine  Homilies  and  Re- 
cognitions and  the  Apostolic  Constitutions,  the  dates  of 
which  are  uncertain,  we  come  to  Eusebius,  who  gives  us, 
in  the  fourth  century,  the  fully  developed  tradition,  viz., 
that  Peter  followed  Simon  to  Rome,  where  he  overcame 
him  by  supernatural  power.  The  account  in  Eusebius 
bears  plain  marks  of  resting  on  the  testimony  of  Justin 
Martyr  concerning  Simon's  going  to  Rome,  for  he  quotes 
Justin  Martyr's  account,  following  it  with  his  own  ac- 
count of  Peter.  Further,  he  alludes  to  the  statue  to 
Simon  at  Rome,  and  gives,  as  the  date  of  Peter's  going 
to  Rome,  the  same  date  which  Justin  Martyr  had  as- 
signed to  the  visit  of  Simon  Magus.  Where  Justin  got 
his  date  or  his  account  of  Simon  Magus  he  does  not 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  329 

tell  us.  If  it  were  historically  verifiable,  it  would  not 
make  the  Peter  legend  any  the  more  true.  But  the 
fact  is  that  Justin's  date,  viz.,  "In  the  reign  of  Clau- 
dius," afterwards  attached  to  the  growing  Peter  legend, 
is  the  foundation  stone  on  which  the  Roman  papal  claim 
really  rests. 

Whether  Peter  ever  visited  Rome  has  been  one  of 
the  much  mooted  questions  of  history.  It  began  to  be 
disputed  in  the  fourteenth  century.  But  even  later  Pro- 
testant historians  have,  some  of  them,  like  Neander, 
allowed  to  their  Romanist  opponents  that  so  unanimous 
a  tradition  had  an  air  of  probability.  Such  a  concession 
cannot  be  made  to-day.  Historical  criticism  finds  no 
ground  even  of  probability  that  Peter  ever  left  Palestine 
for  Italy.  The  whole  story  rests  on  the  visit  to  Rome 
of  Simon  Magus,  which  is  a  complete  fiction,  born,  we 
must  believe,  in  the  brain  of  Justin,  as  he  mused  over 
the  inscription  on  the  statue  of  a  Sabine  god  which  he 
misread  or  mistranslated.  The  discovery,  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  of  the  pedestal  of  such  a  statue,  with  the 
inscription  Semoni  Sanco  Deo,  has  solved  the  riddle.^ 
Much  has  been  made  of  the  unanimous  character  of  the 
later  Peter  legend.  But  such  proof  would  establish 
the  historicity  of  many  of  the  absurdest  traditions  ex- 
tant. All  tradition  becomes  unanimous  when  once 
fixed.  Peter's  supposed  tomb,  over  which  St.  Peter's 
church  was  afterwards  built,  has  no  doubt  settled  many 
a  wavering  mind  in  favor  of  Peter's  martyrdom  at 
Rome.  But  there  was  scarcely  an  illustrious  saint  or 
martyr  in  the  apostolic  or  post^apostolic  church  whose 
bones  were  not  discovered,  if  we  may  believe  tradition, 
in  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries.  Jerome  was  the 
greatest  scholar  of  his  age.     Yet  he  believed  that  the 

1  Schaff's  History  of  the  Apostolic  Church,  p.  371  j   Fowler's 
Roman  Festivals,  p.  130. 


330  APPENDIX 

bones  of  Andrew,  of  Luke,  of  Timothy,  and  even  of 
Samuel,  had  been  exhumed  and  brought  by  the  Em- 
peror Constantius  to  Constantinople.  So  Augustine 
gravely  informs  us  that  the  bones  of  the  first  martyr 
Stephen  had  been  discovered  by  a  miracle,  and  distrib- 
uted over  North  Africa,  and  he  relates  that  some 
seventy  persons  had  within  his  knowledge  been  healed 
by  their  sacred  touch.  How  much  historical  value  can 
attach  to  the  reputed  tomb  of  Peter  or  of  any  other 
saint  in  such  grossly  uncritical  times,  when  men  like 
Jerome  and  Augustine  were  ready  to  accept  on  the 
merest  hearsay  every  such  marvel !  The  whole  Peter 
tradition,  then,  must  be  dismissed  as  a  pure  legend  from 
beginning  to  end.     No  sifting  process  is  possible. 

Now  what  is  true  of  the  Petrine  legend  is  equally 
true  of  the  Johannine.  In  fact  the  balance  between 
them  leans  in  favor  of  the  Petrine,  for  behind  the  Pe- 
trine legend  is  a  basis  of  historical  fact,  to  wit,  the  his- 
torical Simon  of  the  Acts,  and  his  meeting  with  Peter 
in  Samaria.  But  no  such  fact  lies  behind  the  Johannine 
tradition.  It  starts  out  of  the  completest  historical 
darkness,  we  know  not  how  or  when  or  where.  It  may 
be  suggested  that  Christ's  words  to  Peter  concerning 
John,  as  given  at  the  end  of  the  fourth  Gospel,  is  a  his- 
torical basis  for  the  tradition  of  his  long  life.  But  the 
date  and  historicity  of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  the  very 
question  at  issue,  and  it  cannot  therefore  be  used  in 
evidence.  Are  not  the  reputed  expressions  of  Christ 
concerning  John  rather  evidence  that  the  Gospel  was 
written  at  a  time  when  the  tradition  of  John's  great 
longevity  was  already  spread  abroad  ?  The  testimony 
given  at  the  beginning  of  the  Apocalypse  concerning 
the  seer  of  Patmos,  whose  name  is  given  as  John,  cannot 
be  accepted  as  bearing  on  the  question  at  issue.  The 
Apocalypse  is  not  history  and  does  not  pretend  to  be. 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  331 

Whether  the  name  of  John  was  assumed  by  some  un- 
known writer,  as  was  so  frequently  the  case  in  that 
period,  or  if  a  real  John,  what  John  it  was,  —  for  there 
were  Johns  many  in  those  days,  as  there  have  been 
ever  since,  —  is  wholly  uncertain.  There  is  nothing  in 
the  passage  to  identify  the  seer  of  Patmos  with  John  the 
Apostle.  A  later  tradition  identifies  him  with  John  the 
Elder  of  Ephesus.  The  whole  story  of  John's  exile  to 
Patmos  is  late,  and  is  attached  to  other  stories  that  are 
historically  impossible,  such  as  the  effort  to  put  him  to 
death  by  immersing  him  in  a  caldron  of  boiling  oil. 
The  first  allusion  to  it  is  at  the  very  end  of  the  second 
century,  when  the  way  had  already  been  prepared  for 
it.  It  is  true  the  Apocalypse  in  some  form  had  already 
seen  the  light,  for  Justin  Martyr  alludes  to  it,  but  he 
says  nothing  about  the  exile  to  Patmos.  When  the 
proem  was  prefixed  is  unknown.  Thus  all  historical 
basis  for  the  Johannine  tradition  seems  to  be  wholly 
wanting. 

But  I  do  not  forget  the  protest  that  will  at  once  be 
raised  by  the  defenders  of  the  Johannine  authorship 
of  the  fourth  Gospel.  Their  last  rallying  point  is  the 
testimony  of  Irenaeus,  and  to  this  I  now  turn  my  atten- 
tion. It  is  noticeable  that  a  change  has  come  over  the 
method  of  defense  of  the  Johannine  authorship  within 
the  last  generation.  Formerly  it  was  usual  to  rely  on 
the  growing  unanimity  of  tradition.  Thus  Dean  Alford 
in  his  New  Testament  commentary  holds  the  ground 
that  tradition  as  a  whole  is  completely  trustworthy,  and 
that  the  different  parts  support  each  other.  But  as  the 
progress  of  critical  investigation  has  demonstrated  more 
and  more  clearly  the  untenableness  of  such  a  position, 
there  has  been  a  tendency  to  fall  back  upon  Irenaeus  as 
the  main  historical  support  of  the  conservative  side. 
This  is  well  illustrated  in  the  writings  of  Professor  G.  P. 


332  APPENDIX 

Fisher,  which  on  the  whole  contain,  in  my  view,  the 
clearest  and  most  forcible  statement  of  the  arguments 
in  favor  of  the  Johannine  authorship  within  my  know- 
ledge. In  his  earlier  book,  "  Essays  on  the  Supernatural 
Origin  of  Christianity,"  Professor  Fisher  makes  general 
tradition  his  main  support,  and  goes  carefuUy  over  the 
whole  ground.  Irenaeus  of  course  has  his  place  in  this 
consensus  of  tradition,  but  it  is  not  specially  magnified. 
Professor  Fisher,  too,  with  Alf ord,  relies  on  the  mutually 
supporting  character  of  the  traditional  chain  of  events, 
concluding  his  survey  with  these  words  :  "  Not  all  these 
separate  items  of  evidence  are  of  equal  strength.  To- 
gether they  constitute  an  irrefragable  argument,"  and 
he  concludes  that  "  it  is  morally  impossible  to  discredit 
the  tradition  of  the  early  church."  But  it  is  plain  at 
once  that  such  a  line  of  argument  cannot  be  sustained 
in  the  light  of  the  most  recent  researches.  As  we  have 
shown,  every  "separate  item"  of  traditional  evidence 
fatally  fails  of  any  clear  historical  basis  and  support. 
"Out  of  nothing  nothing  can  come"  is  an  axiom  as 
true  in  history  as  in  nature.  A  hundred  weak  argu- 
ments cannot  make  one  strong  argument.  A  dozen 
broken  cisterns  hold  no  more  water  than  one.  If  every 
link  of  the  chain  is  weak,  the  whole  chain  is  weak,  how- 
ever long  you  may  make  it.  No  wonder,  then,  that  in 
Professor  Fisher's  later  "  Beginnings  of  Christianity  " 
he  puts  Irenseus  immediately  at  the  front,  declaring 
that  "the  strongest  consideration,  as  far  as  external 
proof  is  concerned,  centres  in  Polycarp,  and  in  the  rela- 
tions of  Irenseus  to  this  Father."  Professor  Fisher 
proceeds  to  quote  Irenaeus  at  length,  and  makes  his  tes- 
timony the  very  chief  corner-stone  of  the  external 
evidence.  In  taking  this  new  position.  Professor  Fisher 
shows  his  clear  historical  insight.  He  realizes  that  tra- 
dition is  worthless  and  fades  at  once  into  pure  legend 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  333 

unless  it  rests  on  some  trustworthy  historical  foun- 
dations. K  Irenseus'  writings  have  come  down  to  us 
in  authentic  form,  and  his  testimony  can  be  accepted 
as  trustworthy  and  authoritative,  we  find  ourselves  on 
firm  historical  ground.  Here  then  we  are  brought  face 
to  face  with  the  question  that  is  practically  decisive. 
Does  the  evidence  of  Irenseus  stand  the  test  of  historical 
criticism,  and  is  its  author  left  unscathed  as  a  credible 
historical  witness  ? 

In  considering  this  point  there  is,  to  begin  with,  a 
preliminary  question  of  textual  criticism.  The  original 
Greek  of  Irenaeus'  work,  "Against  Heresies,"  is  lost. 
Only  a  Latin  version  remains  to  us,  with  the  exception 
of  copious  quotations  from  the  Greek  by  Epiphanius  and 
Hippolytus.  The  learned  editors  of  the  "Ante-Nicene 
Christian  Library"  affirm  that  "the  text,  both  Greek 
and  Latin,  is  most  uncertain."  "  Irenaeus,  even  in  the 
original  Greek,  is  often  a  very  obscure  writer ;  and  the 
Latin  version  adds  to  these  difficulties  of  the  original 
by  being  itself  of  the  most  barbarous  character.  In 
fact  it  is  often  necessary  to  make  a  conjectural  retrans- 
lation  of  it  into  Greek,  in  order  to  obtain  some  inkhng 
of  what  the  author  wrote."  "  The  author  of  the  Latin 
version  is  unknown,  but  he  was  certainly  little  quahfied 
for  his  task."  Of  the  lost  writings  of  Irenaeus  a  few 
fragments  are  preserved,  especially  one  which  contains 
a  passage  of  great  importance  in  its  relation  to  our  sub- 
ject. The  genuineness  of  this  fragment  rests  wholly 
on  the  authority  of  Eusebius,  who  wrote  his  "  Ecclesias- 
tical History  "  a  century  and  a  haK  later.  With  these 
textual  facts  before  him  the  historical  critic  is  obliged 
to  confess  that  the  very  basis  of  a  just  critical  review 
and  estimate  of  Irenaeus'  character  as  a  credible  witness 
seems  ready  to  slip  away  from  under  his  feet,  and  one 
cannot  help  raising  at  once  the  question  whether  the 


334  APPENDIX 

testimony  of  Irenaeus,  in  view  of  the  uncertain  character 
and  purity  of  the  original  text  and  of  the  Latin  version, 
can  he  allowed  any  credibility  at  aU,  except  so  far  as 
it  is  sustained  by  other  credible  evidence.  In  fact,  on 
the  special  points  in  question,  where  his  testimony  has 
most  importance,  it  stands  alone.  But  we  must  accept 
the  text  of  the  Greek  quotations  and  Latin  version  as 
we  have  it,  and  deal  with  it  as  best  we  may. 

At  the  outset  it  is  to  be  noted  that  Irenaeus  has  suf- 
fered recently  in  a  general  way,  with  all  the  early  Far 
thers,  in  the  matter  of  historical  and  critical  reliability 
and  voraciousness.  All  alike  were  utterly  wanting  in 
the  scientific  and  critical  temper.  Irenaeus  was  perhaps 
no  worse  than  the  rest,  but  he  displays  again  and  again 
a  wonderfully  childish  innocence  and  creduhty.  For 
example,  he  accepts  without  hesitation  a  legendary  tra- 
dition that  had  grown  up  among  the  Alexandrian  Jews 
concerning  the  miraculous  origin  of  the  Greek  Septua- 
gint  version  of  the  Old  Testament,  to  the  effect  that 
King  Ptolemy  separated  the  seventy  translators  from 
each  other,  and  that  when  their  translations  were  com- 
pared they  agreed  "  word  for  word  from  beginning  to 
end."  Irenaeus  was  the  first  to  defend  the  canonicity 
of  our  four  present  gospels  against  the  claims  of  other 
gospels  then  extant  as  urged  by  the  Gnostics.  His 
argument  is  a  curious  illustration  of  his  utter  want  of 
critical  sagacity.  He  begins  by  asserting  that  it  is  not 
possible  that  the  gospels  can  be  either  more  or  fewer  in 
number  than  they  are,  and  the  reason  given  is  that 
"  there  are  four  zones  of  the  earth,  and  four  principal 
winds."  "  The  cherubim  too  were  fourfold,  and  their 
faces  were  images  of  the  dispensation  of  the  Son  of 
God."  So  the  Gospel  of  John  is  like  a  lion,  that  of 
Luke  is  symbolized  by  a  calf,  Matthew  by  a  man,  and 
Mark  by  the  eagle.      "For  the  living  creatures  are 


THE   JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  335 

quadriform,  and  the  gospel  is  quadriform."  "That 
these  gospels  alone  are  true  and  reliable,  and  admit  nei- 
ther increase  nor  diminution  of  the  aforesaid  number,  I 
have  thus  proved !  "  Further  argument  Irenseus  deems 
unnecessary.  Against  persons  who  had  gathered  from 
the  Synoptics  that  Christ's  public  ministry  extended  only 
a  year,  Irenseus  quotes  the  answer  of  the  Jews,  as  given 
in  the  fourth  Gospel,  "  Thou  art  not  yet  fifty  years  old, 
and  hast  thou  seen  Abraham  ?  "  and  argues  hence  that 
Christ's  ministry  must  have  continued  from  ten  to 
twenty  years.  If  these  illustrations  are  not  enough,  I 
will  add  one  more  which  shows  how  ready  he  was  to 
accept  as  authentic  any  tradition  that  came  to  him. 
Oral  sayings  ascribed  to  Christ  were  prevalent  in  this 
period.  Irenseus  quotes  one  such  saying  which  he  de- 
clares that  John  the  Apostle  heard  from  Christ's  own 
lips  and  communicated  to  "  the  elders,"  concerning  the 
millennial  times  :  "  The  days  wiU  come  in  which  vines 
shall  grow,  each  having  ten  thousand  branches,  and  in 
each  branch  ten  thousand  twigs,  and  in  each  twig  ten 
thousand  shoots,  and  on  each  shoot  ten  thousand  clus- 
ters, and  on  each  cluster  ten  thousand  grapes,  and  each 
grape  when  pressed  will  yield  five  and  twenty  measures 
of  wine."  This  remarkable  logion,  so  out  of  character 
on  the  lips  of  Jesus,  appears  in  its  earliest  form  in  the 
Jewish  Apocalypse  of  Baruch.  Irenseus  makes  Papias 
his  voucher  for  it,  calling  him  "a  hearer  of  John." 
But  Papias,  as  we  shall  see,  was  not  a  hearer  of  John 
the  Apostle  but  of  another  John,  "  the  Elder."  Still, 
l*apias  might  have  given  currency  to  this  reputed  say- 
ing of  Christ.  Eusebius  refers  to  certain  "other  ac- 
counts of  Papias  which  had  been  received  by  him  from 
unwritten  tradition,"  which  Eusebius  himself  regarded 
as  "rather  too  fabulous,"  declaring  that  Papias  "was 
very  Hmited  in  his  comprehension," — a  statement  which 


336  APPENDIX 

would  seem  equally  applicable  to  Irenaeus,  at  least  so 
far  as  historical  matters  are  concerned. 

What  now  is  the  inference  which  the  historical  critic 
must  draw  from  such  illustrations  as  these  concerning 
Irenaeus  as  a  historical  witness.  Certainly  but  one  an- 
swer is  possible,  to  wit,  that  he  can  be  credited  only  in 
cases  where  critical  skill  is  not  called  for,  and  where 
he  is  dealing  with  matters  that  have  come  so  recently 
under  his  observation  that  there  can  be  no  room  for 
failure  or  inaccuracy  of  memory.  This  verdict  on  the 
historical  credibility  of  Irenaeus  is  essentially  the  same 
that  must  be  passed  on  all  the  early  Fathers.  Even 
such  great  lights  as  Origen,  Jerome,  and  Eusebius  are 
utterly  unreliable  on  all  historical  questions  where  the 
exercise  of  a  scientific  or  critical  faculty  is  required,  or 
when  the  event  in  issue  is  quite  removed  from  present 
cognizance.  To  each  and  all  alike  the  power  to  distin- 
guish fact  and  legend  by  means  of  historical  criticism 
is  wholly  wanting.  The  history  of  the  Peter  legend 
amply  illustrates  this.  To  the  want  of  critical  tact  must 
also  be  added  an  entire  want  of  historical  candor.  The 
bigotry  and  uncharitableness  of  the  early  Fathers,  shown 
in  their  treatment  of  their  theological  opponents,  is  so 
strong  as  to  throw  discredit  on  all  their  statements  con- 
cerning those  who  disagree  with  them.  It  was  the  dis- 
covery of  the  historical  untrustworthiness  of  these  early 
Fathers  that  has  stimulated  recent  critical  studies  in 
Christian  origins,  and  the  result  has  been  to  remove 
much  of  the  halo  of  veneration  and  sacredness  with 
which  tradition  had  invested  them.  The  idealized  leg- 
endary histories  of  the  early  church  that  used  to  be 
written  are  practically  useless  to-day. 

But  to  return  to  Irenaeus.  The  testimony  to  which 
such  prominence  has  been  given  by  Professor  Fisher  and 
others  is  as  follows :  Irenaeus  relates  that  in  his  child- 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  337 

hood  and  youth  in  Asia  he  heard  Polycarp  discourse 
and  "  speak  of  his  familiar  intercourse  with  John  and 
with  the  rest  of  those  who  had  seen  the  Lord."  These 
reminiscences  were  written  when  Irenseus  was  a  bishop 
in  Gaul  and  quite  advanced  in  years,  as  late  as  A.  d. 
185.  Polycarp  had  died  a  generation  earher,  and  it 
must  have  been  nearly  if  not  quite  a  generation  earlier 
still  when  Irenaeus  as  a  youth  saw  and  heard  him. 
There  is  no  evidence  that  Irenseus  had  met  Polycarp 
afterwards.  The  question  at  once  arises  as  to  the  accu- 
racy and  credibihty  of  one's  memory  of  events  so  early 
in  life,  in  the  case  of  a  man,  quite  old,  recalling  the 
scenes  of  his  youth.  The  treachery  of  memory  in  such 
cases  is  proverbial.  The  broad  lines  of  events  in  one's 
youth  are  usually  quite  indelible,  but  the  particular  in- 
cidental facts  that  are  connected  with  the  general  cur- 
rent of  events  are,  as  a  rule,  quite  beyond  the  power  of 
recovery.  Mr.  LesHe  Stephen,  the  editor  of  the  new 
"  Dictionary  of  Biography,"  in  a  recent  article  in  the 
"  National  Review,"  draws  out  of  his  personal  experience 
as  an  editor  some  vivid  illustrations  of  the  fallacious 
character  of  memory  concerning  the  events  of  one's  past 
life,  and  concludes  that  letters  written  when  the  events 
were  fresh  in  the  memory,  "  in  the  main,  are  the  one 
essential  to  a  thoroughly  satisfactory  life."  He  refers 
to  an  experience  in  his  own  Ufe  concerning  an  old  letter 
which  he  had  burnt,  and  the  contents  of  which  in  later 
life  he  had  entirely  forgotten,  the  result  being  that  "I 
now  only  know  that  my  own  account  of  my  life  is  some- 
how altogether  wrong."  He  multiplies  such  cases  and 
concludes:  "Such  incidents  represent  the  ease  with 
which  the  common  legend  of  a  life  grows  up,  and  the 
sole  correction  for  good  or  for  bad  is  the  contemporary 
document."  Now  this  is  just  the  trouble  with  the  ac- 
count given  by  Irenaeus  in  his  old  age  of  a  transaction 


338  APPENDIX 

of  his  youth.  There  is  no  "  contemporary  document " 
to  sustain  its  accuracy.  I  dwell  on  this  feature  of  the 
case,  because  it  will  be  found  to  be  at  the  very  root  of  our 
whole  judgment  concerning  the  credibility  of  Irenseus' 
testimony.  The  whole  question  at  last  is  resolved  into 
this :  Can  the  memory  of  Irenaeus  be  relied  upon  for 
the  exact  particular  facts  related  a  half  century  or  so 
after,  concerning  what  transpired  in  his  youth  ?  For  not 
only  is  there  no  "  contemporary  document "  to  validate 
Irenaeus'  accuracy  of  information  or  memory,  but  what 
testimony  we  have  is  of  a  directly  contrary  character. 
I  refer  to  that  of  Papias,  a  contemporary  of  Polycarp. 
Irenseus  declares  that  Papias  was  also  a  "hearer  of 
John."  But  Papias  himself  in  the  fragments  preserved 
in  Eusebius  gives  evidence  that  Irenaeus  was  mistaken. 
For  Papias  distinguishes  two  Johns,  "  John  the  disciple 
of  the  Lord  "  and  "  John  the  Elder,"  putting  the  first 
John  in  the  number  of  Christ's  immediate  disciples, 
and  the  second  among  "  the  followers  "  of  the  Apostles. 
Papias  does  not  pretend  to  have  heard  John  the  Apostle 
or  any  other  of  the  first  generation  of  Christ's  disciples. 
But  he  declares  that  he  gathered  what  he  could  orally 
from  the  followers  of  John  and  his  fellow  Apostles,  and 
among  them  he  mentions  "John  the  Elder."  Papias 
thus  distinguishes  three  generations  of  disciples,  —  the 
original  Apostles,  the  followers  of  those  Apostles,  and 
those  who,  like  himself,  learned  from  these  followers  at 
second  hand  what  the  disciples  of  the  first  generation 
said.  Eusebius  draws  special  attention  to  this  mistake 
of  Irenaeus  and  corrects  it,  saying  that  "  Papias  by  no 
means  asserts  that  he  was  a  hearer  and  eyewitness  of 
the  holy  Apostles,  but  informs  us  that  he  received  the 
doctrine  of  faith  from  their  intimate  friends."  He  also 
adds  that  Papias  elsewhere  says  expressly  that  he  was 
"a  hearer  of  John  the  Elder,"  and  quotes  a  tradition 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  339 

concerning  Mark  which  he  heard  from  him.  Thus  the 
testimony  of  Papias  himself  proves  that  he  had  never 
seen  John  the  Apostle  and  that  Irenaeus  was  mistaken 
in  his  assertion  that  Papias  was  a  "  hearer  of  John." 
Plainly  Irenaeus  had  somehow  confounded  the  two  Johns, 
as  Eusebius  suggests. 

The  query  naturally  arises,  whether  Irenaeus  was  not 
guilty  of  the  same  confusion  in  the  case  of  Polycarp. 
For  Polycarp  was  contemporary  with  Papias,  as  Irenaeus 
himself  declared.  The  truth  seems  to  be  that  Irenaeus 
had  confounded  two  generations  of  disciples  or  elders, 
and  so  placed  Polycarp  and  Papias  together  in  the 
second  generation,  instead  of  distinguishing  them  from 
the  "  followers  "  of  the  Apostles  and  so  putting  them 
in  the  third  generation  of  disciples  where  they  really 
belonged,  on  the  testimony  of  Papias  himself.  This 
view  of  the  matter  is  also  in  harmony  with  all  we  know 
concerning  Polycarp.  In  his  Epistle  to  the  Philip- 
pians,  which  seems  to  be  genuine,  there  is  no  reference 
to  any  personal  relation  with  John  the  Apostle.  John's 
name  is  not  even  mentioned.  This  is  the  more  remark- 
able since  Polycarp  refers  to  Paul  again  and  again,  and 
frequently  quotes  from  his  epistles.  Especially  on  one 
occasion  he  speaks  of  "  Paul  himself  and  the  rest  of 
the  Apostles."  If  he  had  held  such  "familiar  inter- 
course with  John  "  the  Apostle  as  Irenaeus  represents, 
how  natural  would  it  have  been  to  make  some  personal 
reference  to  him  in  this  connection.  There  was  a  spe- 
cial reason,  to  be  sure,  for  his  frequent  reference  to 
Paul,  since  Paul  had  visited  Philippi  and  had  after- 
wards written  an  epistle  to  the  church  there.  But  is 
it  not  strange  that  in  Polycarp's  own  Epistle,  which 
is  full  of  quotations  from  some  Synoptic  form  of  the 
gospel,  either  oral  or  written,  and  from  Paul's  epis- 
tles, there  should  not  be  a  single  quotation  from  that 


340  APPENDIX 

Gospel  which  he  must  have  so  greatly  prized,  or  even  a 
hint  of  its  existence !  It  is  also  a  fact  of  no  little  sig- 
nificance that  Polycarp  should  have  repeatedly  set  forth 
his  doctrine  of  God  the  Father  and  of  Christ  the  Son, 
and  yet  made  no  allusion  at  all  to  the  Holy  Spirit,  if 
the  fourth  Gospel  was  in  his  hands.  For  that  Gospel 
has  a  clear  trinitarian  character  and  really  completes 
the  evolution  of  the  dogma  of  the  Trinity  hy  its  doctrine 
of  the  Paraclete.  But  the  term  Paraclete  does  not 
appear  in  the  Epistle,  nor  does  Polycarp  give  any  evi- 
dence in  it  that  he  held  the  full  trinitarian  dogma. 
How  could  that  have  been,  if  Polycarp  was  acquainted 
with  the  fourth  Gospel  ?  Further,  the  chief  peculiarity 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  its  Logos  doctrine.  Defenders 
of  the  Johannine  authorship  hold  that  John's  Gospel 
introduced  the  Logos  doctrine  into  christology.  If  this 
be  true,  and  if  Polycarp  was  a  hearer  of  John,  and  ac- 
quainted with  his  Gospel,  how  can  it  be  explained  that 
Polycarp's  christology  knows  nothing  of  the  Logos  ? 

Polycarp's  death  occurred  in  A.  d.  155  or  later,  and 
even  allowing  the  truth  of  the  tradition  of  his  great  age, 
he  cannot  be  made  contemporary  with  John  except  by 
assuming  the  truth  of  the  unhistorical  tradition  that 
John  also  lived  to  an  equally  great  age.  Such  is  the 
slender  thread  of  historical  assumption  on  which  the 
Johannine  problem  reaUy  hangs.  But  even  the  tradi- 
tion of  Polycarp's  extreme  longevity  cannot  be  regarded 
as  authentic  history.  It  depends  wholly  on  the  "  Mar- 
tyrdom of  Polycarp,"  which  bears  such  clear  traces  of 
interpolation  and  is  so  fiUed  with  miraculous  and  legen- 
dary elements  that  it  is  impossible  to  sift  out  of  it  the 
grains,  if  there  be  any,  of  historical  fact.  Thus  we  are 
thrown  back  on  the  single  testimony  of  Irenseus,  which 
is  unconfirmed  by  Polycarp  himself,  and  is  opposed  to 
the  indirect  counter  testimony  of  Papias.     So  that  the 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  341 

case  stands  thus :  Irenaeus  in  his  old  age  gives  a  remi- 
niscence of  his  youth  in  regard  to  which  clear  evidence 
shows  that  he  must  have  confounded  two  generations  of 
disciples  together  and  in  this  way  confounded  a  John 
of  the  first  generation  with  a  John  of  the  second.  Thus 
only  can  all  the  known  facts  be  harmonized.  So  that 
the  conclusion  is  forced  upon  us  that  Irenaeus,  either  by 
failure  of  memory  or  want  of  sufficient  information, 
was  mistaken.  It  is  my  firm  conviction  that  no  other 
conclusion  is  possible,  and  my  only  wonder  is  that  any 
scholars  are  stiU  found  to  take  exception  to  it,  or  to 
defend  the  credibility  of  Irenaeus'  testimony.  When 
one  considers  how  treacherous  the  memory  becomes  in 
the  course  of  a  long  life,  how  utterly  uncritical  Irenaeus 
was  concerning  all  historical  events,  and  how  easy  it  was 
for  him  to  confound  two  persons  of  the  same  name  as 
he  wandered  back  in  memory  among  the  uncertain  and 
darkening  shadows  of  his  youthful  days,  it  is  certainly 
much  easier  to  believe  that  he  was  mistaken  as  to  Poly- 
carp's  true  relation  to  John  the  Apostle  than  to  believe 
that  he  was  right,  when  corroborating  evidence  is  wholly 
wanting,  and  especially  when  we  remember  that  in 
making  a  similar  assertion  concerning  Papias  he  was 
certainly  wrong. 

I  have  dwelt  thus  fully  on  this  first  division  of  the 
subject,  because  I  regard  the  result  at  which  we  have 
arrived  concerning  the  real  facts  of  the  life  of  John  as 
practically  settling  the  whole  question  as  to  the  Johan- 
nine  authorship  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  Remove  the 
legendary  traditions  concerning  John's  sojourn  in 
Ephesus,  and  his  extreme  longevity  reaching  to  the 
reign  of  Trajan,  and  acknowledge,  as  we  must,  it  seems 
to  me,  the  complete  unrehability  of  the  testimony  of 
Irenaeus,  and  little  ground  is  left  on  which  to  base  the 
Johannine  authorship.     Whether  any  such  ground  is  to 


342  APPENDIX 

be  found  in  the  two  following  divisions  of  the  subject, 
we  now  proceed  to  consider. 

II.  We  next  have  to  deal  with  the  character  of  the 
fourth  Gospel  as  compared  with  the  Synoptic  gospels, 
and  the  earliest  known  date  of  its  appearance  in  his- 
tory. No  one  can  read  the  fourth  Gospel,  even  in  the 
most  cursory  way,  without  realizing  at  once  that  its 
whole  intellectual  and  religious  atmosphere  and  tone  of 
thought  is  in  complete  contrast  with  that  of  the  Synop- 
tics. Its  very  introduction,  with  its  sharply  defined 
Logos  doctrine,  removes  us  entirely  from  Jewish  Pales- 
tinian ideas,  and  transfers  us  to  Greek  Alexandrian 
philosophic  thought.  The  whole  christology  of  the 
fourth  Gospel  is  radically  different  from  that  of  the 
Synoptics,  and  indicates  a  long  process  of  evolution. 
As  we  have  seen,  the  Synoptic  gospels  hold  the  view 
of  Christ's  Messianic  character.  He  is  the  promised 
anointed  one  of  David's  royal  line.  There  is  no  hint 
of  a  superhuman  preexistence,  or  of  a  Logos  doctrine. 
But  the  fourth  Gospel  at  once  goes  back  of  Christ's 
human  birth  into  the  eternity  of  the  divine  existence, 
and  out  of  God  himself  by  a  divine  incarnation  makes 
Christ  proceed ;  and  this  divine  nature  of  Christ,  as  the 
eternal  Logos  of  God,  is  the  keynote  of  the  whole 
Gospel.  Christ  is  no  longer  a  human  Messiah  with  a 
divine  commission,  but  is  a  divine  being,  metaphysically 
united  to  God  himself,  and  thus  able  to  mediate  in  a 
cosmological  rather  than  a  soteriological  way  between 
God  and  man.  We  have  explained  the  relation  of  the 
Pauline  christology  to  that  of  the  Synoptics.  Paul 
advanced  from  the  Jewish  Messianism  to  the  Greek 
Philonic  mediatorship  dogma  borrowed  from  paganism. 
But  the  fourth  Gospel  proceeded  a  step  further,  raising 
Christ  above  the  Pauline  position  of  a  /x.eo-tr>;s  or  middle 
being  between  God  and  man,  to  that  of  the  Aoyos  of 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  343 

Grod,  God  of  God,  derived  indeed,  but  essentially  divine. 
There  are  close  resemblances,  with  some  sharp  differ- 
ences, as  we  have  noted,  between  the  Logos  doctrine  of 
the  fourth  Gospel  and  that  of  Justin  Martyr,  indicating 
a  common  chronological  stage  of  evolution.  But  to  at- 
tempt to  coordinate  the  christology  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
with  that  of  the  primitive  Synoptics  involves  an  ana- 
chronism of  nearly  a  century. 

In  the  second  place,  the  fourth  Gospel  differs  radi- 
cally from  the  Synoptic  gospels  in  its  doctrine  of  the 
essential  ground  and  character  of  the  Christian  life. 
In  the  Synoptics  Chi'ist  is  represented  as  making  the 
essence  of  his  religion  to  consist  in  a  life  of  Christian 
trust  and  love  and  obedience.  There  is  no  marked 
dogmatic  element  in  his  teaching.  No  creed  concerning 
his  own  metaphysical  relation  to  God  is  made  the  basis 
of  discipleship.  Repent,  accept  my  gospel  of  the  new 
kingdom,  and  "  follow  me  "  as  your  anointed  leader, 
is  his  constant  message.  But  how  different  is  the 
teaching  of  the  fourth  Gospel !  It  begins  with  setting 
forth  in  theological  form  the  dogma  of  Christ's  com- 
plete divinity,  and  to  accept  that  dogma  as  an  article  of 
faith  is  made  all  through  the  Gospel  the  sole  condition 
of  Christian  discipleship.  "Believe  in  me"  takes  the 
place  of  "  Follow  me."  To  enforce  the  acceptance  of 
this  dogma  is  declared  by  the  author  of  the  Gospel  to 
be  his  purpose  in  writing  it.  "But  these  things  are 
written  that  ye  may  believe  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ,  the 
Son  of  God,  and  that  believing  ye  may  have  life  in  his 
name."  In  the  Synoptics  Christ's  teaching  is  practical 
and  experimental,  inculcating  a  change  of  life  by  a  new 
law  of  love  to  God  and  to  one's  fellow  men.  In  the 
fourth  Gospel  the  whole  point  of  view  is  changed. 
Love  still  remains  the  central  element  of  manifestation 
of  the  Christian  spirit ;  but  how  may  love  spring  up  in 


344  APPENDIX 

the  heart  ?  Dogmatic  belief  is  now  made  the  root  of  all 
true  religious  experience.  In  Christ's  long  discussions 
with  the  Jews,  his  position  is  continually  reiterated: 
"  Except  ye  believe  that  I  am  he,  ye  shall  die  in  your 
sins,"  and  the  special  dogma  on  which  he  insists  is  that 
he  is  the  divine  Son  of  God,  —  a  point  emphasized  so 
strongly  that  the  Jews  charged  him  with  blasphemy  in 
"  making  himself  God."  Not  only  is  the  very  nature 
of  faith  change^  from  the  hearty  acceptance  of  Christ 
as  the  promised  Messiah,  involving  the  following  of  him 
in  loving  discipleship,  to  the  intellectual  acceptance  of  a 
metaphysical  dogma,  but  the  character  of  the  object  of 
faith  is  radically  changed  from  God  the  common  Father 
of  Jesus  and  of  aU  men  to  Christ  himself,  who,  as  the 
Son  of  God,  the  divine  Logos,  is  the  true  mediatorial 
object  of  faith  and  of  worship.  How  different  is  the 
whole  theory  of  the  root  of  personal  religion  in  the 
Synoptics,  as  compared  with  the  fourth  Gospel,  is 
shown  in  the  different  way  in  which  Christ  treats  those 
who  come  to  him.  Compare  his  treatment  of  the  sin- 
ning woman  in  Luke  with  that  of  the  man  blind  from 
his  birth  in  John.  The  woman's  love  and  devotion 
shown  in  her  actions  brings  to  her  Christ's  words: 
"  Thy  faith  hath  saved  thee."  But  when  Christ  finds 
the  blind  man  now  restored  to  sight,  he  asks  him, 
"  Dost  thou  believe  on  the  Son  of  God  ?  "  and  the  reply 
is,  "Lord,  I  believe,"  and  the  record  adds,  "and  he 
worshiped  him."  True  religion  in  the  case  of  the 
woman  of  Luke  consisted  in  works  of  grateful  love ;  in 
the  case  of  the  restored  blind  man  of  John,  it  consisted 
in  reciting  after  Christ  an  article  of  metaphysical  be- 
lief. Thus  the  whole  focus  of  the  Christian  life  is 
changed  from  "  the  way,"  as  it  came  to  be  termed  in 
the  primitive  tradition,  involving  the  following  of  the 
Master  in  a  discipleship  of  loving  sacrifice,  to  a  form  of 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  345 

beKef ,  involving  assent  to  a  christological  dogma.  Here, 
again,  an  evolution  of  doctrine,  requiring  considerable 
time,  is  plainly  discernible.  There  is  no  evidence  of 
any  such  change  in  the  Synoptic  gospels  or  in  the 
Acts.  For  the  Credo  recited  by  the  eunuch  to  Philip  in 
the  eighth  chapter  of  the  Acts  is  a  later  interpolation, 
indicating  the  growing  evolution.  Paul  gives  us  the 
first  step  towards  it.  But  with  him  dogma  is  still 
secondary,  and  faith  and  love  are  primary.  Paul,  how- 
ever, introduces  us  to  the  Greek  metaphysical  conception 
of  religion  as  a  kind  of  philosophy,  and  by  his  dogma 
of  a  iJ,ecrLT7)s  prepares  us  for  the  later  Logos  doctrine. 
It  was  after  the  rise  of  the  Gnostic  systems  and  contro- 
versies that  the  speculative  metaphysical  spirit  fuUy 
entered  Christian  thought  and  led  to  the  development 
of  philosophical  theology.  The  Logos  doctrine  marks 
this  great  change.  So  that  the  history  of  the  christolo- 
gical evolution  points  directly  to  a  time  as  late  at  least 
as  the  middle  of  the  second  century  for  the  date  of  the 
fourth  Gospel.  In  fact,  as  we  have  seen,  it  was  just 
about  this  time  that  the  Logos  doctrine  first  appears  in 
christology,  in  the  writings  of  Justin  Martyr.  So  that 
all  attempts  to  bring  the  Synoptic  gospels  into  doctrinal 
harmony  with  the  Fourth,  we  again  perceive,  involves 
a  flagrant  anachronism. 

Thirdly,  it  is  merely  an  enlargement  of  the  two  points 
of  dijffierence  already  noted,  to  say  that  the  whole  philo- 
sophical character  of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  radically  dif- 
ferent from  that  of  the  Synoptic  gospels.  This  is  so 
patent  that  it  needs  no  further  illustration,  especially  ia,s 
I  have  already  in  the  first  chapter  remarked  on  the  evi- 
dences in  the  fourth  Gospel  of  Philonic  and  Gnostic 
influence.  There  is  no  evidence  that  the  Greek  writings 
of  Philo  had  spread  from  Alexandria  to  Aramaic  Pal- 
estine in  Christ's  day,  or  that  their  influence  was  felt. 


346  APPENDIX 

Paul  shows  some  traces  of  such  influence.  So  too  does 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  But  the  fourth  Gospel 
gives  clear  evidence  of  it,  not  only  in  its  Logos  doctrine, 
but  in  its  metaphysical  conceptions  and  modes  of  thought. 
The  influence  of  Gnosticism  is  equally  apparent  in  its 
vocabulary,  and  especially  in  its  dualistic  ideas.  But 
Gnosticism  did  not  appear  till  the  second  quarter  of  the 
second  century,  and  the  influence  of  Philo  is  not  clearly 
marked  among  the  early  Fathers  till  the  third  century, 
eixcept  so  far  as  it  represented  Greek  philosophy  in  gen- 
eral. So  that  the  fundamental  metaphysical  conceptions 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  point  directly  to  a  period  consid- 
erably later  than  the  Apostolic  age. 

There  is  another  characteristic  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
which  quite  distinguishes  it  from  the  Synoptics.  I  refer 
to  its  mysticism  and  transcendentalism.  The  more 
deeply  one  studies  this  Gospel  the  more  strongly  is  one 
impressed  by  these  features  of  it.  All  religion  has  its 
side  of  other-worldliness  and  of  mystical  thought  and 
feeling, — its  tendency  to  rise  above  the  seen  and  known 
into  the  transcendent  mysteries  of  Absolute  Being.  In 
the  Synoptics  occasional  glimpses  of  such  mystical  flights 
of  Christ's  moral  consciousness  are  revealed  to  us.  Still, 
as  a  whole  these  gospels  are  ethical  and  practical  and 
experimental,  dealing  with  questions  related  to  this  pre- 
sent life.  The  kingdom  of  heaven  which  the  synoptic 
Christ  proclaimed  as  at  hand  was  essentially  of  this 
world,  though  it  shaded  off  into  the  retributions  and  re- 
wards of  a  world  to  come.  But  how  different  is  the 
whole  point  of  view  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  It  is  the 
transcendent  eternal  world  that  comes  into  fuU  view 
from  the  outset.  The  reader  is  carried  at  once  into  the 
invisible  and  transcendent  state  of  being.  Christ  is 
essentially  a  heavenly  personage.  Even  while  on  earth 
he  is  still  "  in  heaven."     The  whole  atmosphere  of  the 


THE  JOHANNINE   PROBLEM  347 

Gospel  is  unearthly  and  supernatural.  Christ  every- 
where walks  among  men  as  if  separated  from  them  by 
some  supernal  relationship.  "He  that  cometh  from 
above  is  above  aU."  His  miracles  partake  of  this  highly 
unnatural,  mystical  character.  He  turns  water  into 
wine  ;  he  raises  Lazarus  from  a  four  days'  death  and  de- 
cay. His  conversations  are  all  keyed  to  the  same  super- 
earthly  and  heavenly  strain.  No  man  hath  seen  the 
Father,  but  Christ  himseK  has.  "  Ye  are  from  beneath, 
I  am  from  above.  Ye  are  of  this  world,  I  am  not  of 
this  world."  Even  "  before  Abraham  was  I  am."  "  I 
and  the  Father  are  one."  For  "  the  Father  is  in  me 
and  I  am  in  the  Father."  And  Christ  seeks  to  draw 
his  own  disciples  into  the  same  mystical  union  with  one 
another,  with  himself,  and  with  God.  For  them  the 
true  religious  life  is  "  the  eternal  life,"  and  that  eternal 
Ufe  consists  in  "knowing  the  only  true  God."  This 
"  eternal  life  "  thus  realized  already  in  the  present  state 
is  the  true  resurrection  life.  "  I  am  the  resurrection 
and  the  life.  Whosoever  liveth  and  believeth  on  me 
shall  never  die."  Thus  time  and  eternity  are  mystically 
united  together,  and  that  great  eschatological  event 
called  the  resurrection,  which  in  the  Synoptics  is  only 
referred  to  as  occurring  at  the  end  of  the  world,  is 
represented  as  a  present  experience.  Such  is  the  lofty 
mysticism  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  How  different  is  the 
picture  of  Christ  here  given  from  that  of  the  Synoptic 
gospels.  How  different  its  picture  of  the  world,  of  man, 
and  of  the  heavenly  kingdom !  The  human,  anointed 
master  of  the  Synoptics  preaching  the  sermon  on  the 
mount,  and  speaking  parables  full  of  practical  wisdom, 
and  thanking  God  that  the  mysteries  of  his  kingdom 
were  revealed  unto  babes,  has  become  in  the  fourth 
Gospel  a  heavenly  descended  Logos,  never  forgetful  of 
his   divine   origin,  distinguishing  himself  from   those 


348  APPENDIX 

among  whom  for  the  while  he  dwelt,  and  seeking  to 
gather  his  own  out  of  the  world  into  the  celestial  society 
from  which  he  came  and  to  wliich  he  was  soon  to  return. 
Could  such  a  transcendent  mystical  gospel  have  been 
written  by  one  of  those  Galilean  fishermen  who,  as  his- 
tory tells,  were  Christ's  closest  disciples  and  from  whom 
came  to  us  the  primitive  synoptic  tradition  ? 

There  is  still  another  point  of  contrast  between  the 
first  three  gospels  and  the  fourth :  the  remarkable 
want  of  harmony,  and,  in  some  instances,  the  irrecon- 
cilability of  the  historical  narratives.  I  do  not  propose 
to  enter  into  a  minute  examination  of  this  point,  for  it 
is  unnecessary.  So  radical  is  the  difference  that  it 
forces  itself  at  once  on  the  reader.  The  old  explanation 
has  been  that  John,  the  assumed  author,  wrote  his  Gospel 
as  a  mere  supplement  to  the  Synoptics.  But  such  an 
explanation  wholly  fails  to  explain.  It  bristles  with 
historical  difficulties.  The  two  accounts  are  completely 
inconsistent  with  each  other,  for  example,  as  to  the 
length  of  Christ's  public  ministry,  his  labors  in  Jerusa- 
lem, the  substance  of  his  discourses,  the  date  of  his 
death,  the  circumstances  of  his  crucifixion  and  resur- 
rection. Surely  if  this  Gospel  is  a  veracious  history  of 
Christ's  life,  though  supplemental  to  other  gospels,  the 
broad  outlines  of  it  would  harmonize  with  them.  But, 
in  the  fourth  Gospel,  not  only  are  events  unrecorded 
which  are  made  prominent  in  the  Synoptics,  such  as 
Christ's  baptism,  his  temptation,  the  institution  of  his 
Supper,  the  scene  in  Gethsemane,  but  events  are  related 
which  we  should  expect  would  have  been  also  recorded 
in  the  other  gospels,  if  they  had  actually  happened. 
Take,  for  instance,  the  raising  of  Lazarus,  —  the  most 
extraordinary  and  conspicuous  miracle  of  which  we  have 
an  account  in  any  of  the  gospels.  When  we  consider 
the  peculiar  circumstances  under  which  it  took  place,  its 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  349 

nearness  to  Jerusalem,  its  publicity,  the  sensation  made 
among  the  crowds  that  were  attending  the  Passover,  the 
eager  curiosity  of  the  "  common  people  "  to  see  Jesus 
and  "  Lazarus  also  whom  he  had  raised  from  the  dead," 
the  fear  felt  by  the  Jewish  leaders  that  such  a  miracle 
would  increase  Christ's  popularity,  and  their  consequent 
efforts  to  secure  his  arrest,  which  led  to  his  betrayal  by 
Judas ;  and  when  we  also  consider  that  the  other  im- 
mediate events  with  which  the  raising  of  Lazarus  was 
closely  connected  are  fully  related  by  the  Synoptics 
without  the  slightest  hint  that  such  a  remarkable  mir- 
acle was  ever  wrought,  it  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  ac- 
cept its  historicity.  How  could  so  startling  an  event, 
which  directly  caused  Christ's  death  and  which  must 
have  been  known  to  all  the  disciples,  have  failed  to  be 
recorded  in  all  the  Synoptic  gospels,  and  have  disap- 
peared utterly  from  the  earliest  Apostolic  traditions? 
Surely  a  miracle  which  helped  to  precipitate  the  tragedy 
of  Calvary  would  not  have  been  left  by  the  disciples 
who  saw  it  to  be  picked  up  and  written  down  a  genera- 
tion after  by  one  of  their  number  in  his  old  age.  A 
strange  bit  of  supplementary  matter  surely !  The  truth 
is  that  such  an  explanation  of  the  origin  and  character 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  would  never  have  been  thought  of 
except  for  the  assumption  that  John  was  the  author  of 
it.  But  when  that  assumption  is  dismissed  and  the 
Gospel  itself  is  consulted,  we  find  the  writer  clearly 
explaining  the  object  he  had  in  view :  "  These  things 
are  written  that  ye  may  believe  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ, 
the  Son  of  God."  The  motive,  then,  is  dogmatic,  not  bio- 
graphical or  historical.  The  events  described  are  only 
the  setting  of  the  dogma,  which  is  the  real  theme.  When 
the  Gospel  is  read  in  the  light  of  this  squarely  avowed 
aim  in  writing  it,  much  becomes  plain  that  before  was 
obscure  and  inexplicable.     It  is  not  the  earthly  career 


350  APPENDIX 

of  Jesus  that  is  set  forth  so  much  as  the  incarnate  life 
of  the  heavenly  Logos,  and  the  historical  events  that  are 
introduced  are  wholly  subordinate  to  and  illustrative  of 
his  divine  character  and  mission.  Thus  the  earthly 
events  of  Christ's  life  are  idealized  and  their  real  his- 
toricity becomes  doubtful.  There  is  a  transcendent  ele- 
ment everywhere  transfiguring  and  divinizing  the  human 
and  historical.  Such  is  the  verdict  which  the  historical 
critic  must  pass  on  the  historicity  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
when  it  is  compared  with  the  Synoptics.  It  is  plain 
that  in  some  way  we  are  no  longer  on  the  same  histor- 
ical ground.  The  author  is  not  writing  a  human  life, 
but  is  expounding  his  thesis  of  a  divine  incarnation  in 
mortal  form,  and  from  this  point  of  view  every  event 
assumes  a  supernatural  and  quasi-unhistorical  character. 
It  is  remarkable  how  little  history  there  is  in  the  Gospel. 
A  few  events  are  referred  to  simply  to  give  opportunity 
for  transcendental  and  mystical  discourses  whose  whole 
strain  and  character  is  utterly  unlike  the  familiar,  prac- 
tical, parabolic  utterances  of  the  Synoptic  gospels.  The 
very  miracles  have  a  dogmatic  purpose  and  prepare  the 
way  for  mystical  utterances.  In  fact,  the  Gospel  as  a 
whole  is  not  so  much  a  biography  of  Christ,  or  even  a 
collection  of  Christ's  sayings,  as  a  series  of  long  conver- 
sations and  discourses  connected  together  and  reduced 
to  a  spiritual  unity  by  certain  sporadic  events  whose 
sole  aim  seems  to  be  to  afford  the  opportunity  to  teach 
the  spiritual  truth  desired.  How  much  of  a  historical 
character  can  be  allowed  to  such  a  gospel  it  is  difficult 
to  say.  But  certainly  when  marvelous  events  are  in- 
troduced, like  the  miracle  of  Cana  or  that  of  Lazarus, 
where  the  dogmatic  motive  is  so  plainly  visible,  it  can 
hardly  be  expected  that  they  should  be  accepted  as  hav- 
ing any  historical  basis,  unless  they  are  supported  by 
other  testimony.     The  difficulty  with  several  of  these 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  351 

acconnts  is  that  they  stand  alone,  and  have  no  historical 
vouchers. 

But  my  object  in  this  critical  comparison  is  not  to 
break  down  the  general  historicity  of  the  fourth  Gos- 
pel, but  to  show  how  impossible  it  is  to  harmonize  its 
historical  accounts  with  those  of  the  Synoptics,  and 
thus  to  make  clear  the  inference  which  must  be  drawn, 
that  the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  cannot  have  been 
one  of  the  original  Galilean  circle  of  disciples.  It  is 
true  that  the  writer  must  have  been  well  acquainted 
with  the  Jews  and  their  country.  But  if  a  Jew  him- 
self, he  is  no  longer  in  sympathy  with  his  countrymen. 
He  writes  as  a  foreigner,  as  belonging  to  a  different 
world.  If  he  was  personally  acquainted  with  Jesus  and 
his  sojourn  of  thirty-three  years  on  earth,  he  takes  little 
interest  in  it.  He  gives  us  no  glimpses  of  his  birth  or 
early  home  in  Nazareth.  His  mind  is  wholly  intent  on 
portraying  those  manifestations  of  divinity  which  should 
prove  him  to  be  the  incarnate  Son  of  God.  Hence  he 
dwells  so  fully  on  the  circumstances  of  Christ's  last 
night  in  the  flesh,  his  arrest,  his  trial,  his  death  and 
resurrection.  These  events  are  the  precursors  of  the  end 
of  the  earthly  life,  under  which  the  eternal  Logos  had 
for  a  brief  period  veiled  himself,  and  of  the  return  to 
that  heavenly  condition  from  which  he  came.  The  de- 
viations here  from  the  Synoptic  gospels  are  peculiar  and 
suggestive.  The  Synoptics  represent  Christ  as  refusing 
to  enter  into  a  defense  of  himself  before  Pilate.  "  He 
answered  nothing,  so  that  the  governor  marveled." 
But  in  the  fourth  Gospel  we  have  a  full  account  of  a 
remarkable  conversation  between  them,  in  which  Christ 
is  made  to  utter  some  of  his  most  idealistic  and  mystical 
sayings.  "My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world."  "To 
this  end  am  I  come  into  the  world  that  I  should  bear 
witness  unto  the  truth.     Every  one  that  is  of  the  truth 


352  APPENDIX 

heareth  my  voice."  There  is  an  equally  notable  differ- 
ence between  the  dying  words  of  Jesus  as  given  in  the 
Synoptics  and  as  given  in  the  fourth  Gospel.  Matthew 
and  Mark  make  him  cry,  "  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast 
thou  forsaken  me  ?  "  Luke  puts  into  his  lips  the  prayer, 
"Into  thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit."  But  our 
fourth  Gospel  author  makes  him  close  his  work  on 
earth  with  the  words  so  full  of  mystic  meaning,  "  It  is 
finished."  In  fact,  the  more  closely  the  four  gospels  are 
studied  in  their  relation  to  each  other,  the  more  radical 
and  complete  grows  the  difference  between  the  fourth 
and  the  others.  The  fourth  Gospel  bears  aU  the  marks 
of  belonging  to  a  later  age  and  to  a  wholly  different 
philosophical  environment.  The  Synoptic  gospels  repre- 
sent early  oral  traditions  which  gradually  were  reduced 
to  writing  by  many  different  hands,  and  which,  after 
various  recensions  and  supplementary  additions,  became 
fixed  in  the  form  in  which  they  have  come  down  to  us. 
The  fourth  Gospel,  on  the  contrary,  was  plainly  the 
work,  in  the  main,  of  a  single  writer,  whose  aim  was 
not  to  gather  together  the  oral  traditions  that  passed 
current  in  his  day  concerning  Christ  and  his  teachings, 
but  to  set  forth  his  own  philosophic  views  of  Christ's 
metaphysical  nature,  and  to  enforce  them  by  means  of 
the  literary  use  of  certain  historical  events.  The  thor- 
oughly philosophical  and  mystical* character  of  the  Gos- 
pel must  always  throw  a  cloud  of  doubt  over  the  evidence 
of  its  complete  historical  veraciousness.  The  author  of 
this  Gospel  was  not  alone  in  making  history  the  vehicle 
of  philosophical  ideas.  It  was  quite  the  fashion  of  his 
day. 

Certainly,  whatever  view  be  taken  of  the  authorship 
of  the  fourth  Gospel,  one  cannot  finish  the  comparison 
between  it  and  the  Synoptics  without  doing  full  justice 
to  its  unique  religious  idealism.     Whoever  the  author 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  353 

was,  he  had  drunk  deeply  of  that  spring  of  spiritual 
truth  which  he  helieved  had  been  opened  to  man  by  a 
being  no  less  exalted  than  the  divine  Son  of  God,  — 
the  metaphysical  mediating  Logos  between  the  unseen 
supreme  Being  and  this  visible  world.  No  wonder  his 
Gospel  has  been  sanctified  and  made  holy,  beyond  all 
other  gospels,  in  the  eyes  of  the  Christian  church,  or 
that  the  Apostle  whom  tradition  made  its  author  became 
the  centre  of  the  most  hallowed  legends.  But  the 
historical  and  critical  spirit  cannot  suspend  its  work  in 
deference  to  any  religious  sentimentalism.  Were  the 
external  evidence  for  the  Johannine  authorship  much 
less  weak  than  it  is,  the  character  of  the  internal  testi- 
mony furnished  by  the  study  of  the  fourth  Gospel  itself 
is  so  overwhelmingly  strong  against  it,  that  it  would 
seem  impossible  to  resist  the  conclusion  that  is  forced 
upon  the  mind.  Much  has  been  made  in  past  times  of 
the  deep  spiritual  character  of  the  fourth  Gospel  as  evi- 
dence of  its  having  been  written  by  an  inspired  Apostle 
who  had  drunk  in  the  living  truth  from  the  lips  of 
Christ  himself.  How,  it  has  been  argued,  could  the  au- 
thor of  such  a  gospel  have  remained  unknown  ?  Such 
an  argument  may  prove  too  much.  Is  not  the  author- 
ship of  some  of  the  noblest  creations  of  human  genius 
unknown :  for  example,  the  books  of  Job  and  Ecclesi- 
astes,  the  second  Isaiah,  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  the 
Synoptic  gospels,  the  Hiad  and  the  Odyssey  ?  No  his- 
torical valid  proof  of  authorship  can  be  built  on  such  a 
priori  assumptions. 

The  result  to  which  the  study  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
thus  leads  us  is  supported  by  its  external  history.  It 
first  clearly  appears  as  a  distinct  gospel  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  second  century.  Theophilus,  who  was  bishop 
of  Antioch  from  168  to  188,  is  the  first  post-apostolic 
writer  to  refer  to  it  as  a  "  holy  writing  "  by  an  "  in- 


354  APPENDIX 

spired"  man,  and  quote  from  it.  Tatian,  a  contem- 
porary of  Theophilus,  gives  apparent  quotations  from 
it,  but  does  not  state  whence  the  quotations  are  derived. 
If  the  "  Diatessaron,"  ascribed  by  tradition  to  Tatian,  be 
genuine,  a  point,  however,  not  wholly  free  from  doubt, 
it  would  furnish  additional  proof  of  Tatian's  use  of  the 
fourth  Gospel.  But  this  fact  would  not  be  so  signifi- 
cant as  some  have  argued,  for  it  does  not  push  back  at 
all  the  date  already  furnished  by  Theophilus.  A  strong 
effort  has  been  made  to  prove  that  Justin  Martyr,  whose 
writings  belong  to  the  third  quarter  of  the  second  cen- 
tury, antedating  a  few  years  those  of  Tatian  and  Theo- 
philus, was  acquainted  with  this  Gospel.  This  effort 
has  been  the  more  persistent,  since  Justin  has  been 
regarded  as  the  real  key  to  the  whole  conservative  posi- 
tion. But  too  much  importance,  in  my  view,  has  been 
given  to  Justin  and  his  relation  to  the  Johannine  pro- 
blem. It  has  been  supposed  that  if  the  date  of  the 
fourth  Gospel  could  be  put  as  early  as  Justin,  "his 
proximity  to  the  Apostles  "  would  give  good  ground  for 
the  claim  of  Johannine  authorship.  But  the  real  point 
at  issue  is  not  whether  the  date  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
can  be  carried  back  a  few  years  more  or  less  earlier, 
but  whether  the  traditions  concerning  John's  later  so- 
journ in  Ephesus  and  his  death  as  late  as  the  reign  of 
Trajan  are  history  or  legend.  If  they  are  unhistorical 
and  legendary,  the  whole  effort  to  push  back  the  date 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  surely  of  little  account.  Allow 
that  not  only  Justin  Martyr,  but  even  the  Gnostics, 
Valentinus  and  Basilides,  were  acquainted  with  it, 
there  still  remains  a  space  of  half  a  century  or  more  to 
be  spanned  in  order  to  connect  the  Gospel  with  John 
as  its  author.  Much  learned  ingenuity  has  been  spent 
in  this  effort,  and,  as  I  think,  wholly  in  vain.  Dr.  Ezra 
Abbot's   essay  is  a  conspicuous   illustration.     He   em- 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  356 

ployed  all  the  resources  of  his  critical  acumen  to  prove 
that  the  date  of  the  fourth  Gospel  could  be  carried 
back  through  Justin  Martyr  and  the  earliest  Gnostics 
to  A.  D.  125.  But  what  avails  aU  this,  if  John  had  been 
dead  fifty  years !  The  vital  weakness  of  Dr.  Abbot's 
essay  is  that  it  assumes  the  historical  credibility  of  a 
mass  of  legends.  He  accepts  "  the  uniform  tradition 
supported  by  great  weight  of  testimony,  that  the  evan- 
gelist John  lived  to  a  very  advanced  age,  spending  the 
latter  portion  of  his  life  in  Asia  Minor,  and  dying  there 
in  the  reign  of  Trajan  not  far  from  A.  d.  110."  But 
what  is  "this  great  weight  of  testimony"  which  Dr. 
Abbot  quietly  assumes  to  be  veracious?  Simply  the 
"  uniform  tradition "  of  legends  that  had  grown  up 
in  the  course  of  centuries,  and,  as  has  been  shown,  have 
no  historical  foundation  and  are  utterly  discredited  by 
critical  scholarship.  Looked  at  from  one  side,  Dr. 
Abbot's  historical  arch  seems  firm.  I  myself  regarded 
it  as  such  twenty  years  ago.  He  starts  from  historical 
ground,  namely,  the  historical  existence  of  the  fourth 
Gospel  in  the  latter  part  of  the  second  century.  On 
this  pillar  he  attempts  to  carry  his  arch  across  half  a 
century  through  Justin  and  Basilides  to  some  historical 
support  on  the  further  side.  But  in  fact  his  arch  stops 
in  the  air.  It  cannot  reach  firm  historical  ground. 
There  remains,  after  all  his  efforts,  a  gap  which  cannot 
be  crossed.  It  is  no  wonder  that  he  laid  hold  of  legen- 
dary materials  which  fifty  years  ago  were  supposed  to 
be  trustworthy,  and  tried  to  build  on  them.  But  the 
"  uniform  tradition  "  of  the  third  and  fourth  centuries 
on  which  such  men  as  Alf  ord  and  Abbot  relied  has  crum- 
bled to  dust,  and  the  arch  so  carefully  constructed  be- 
tween Irenaeus  apd  the  Johannine  legend  of  a  long  old 
age  at  Ephesus  lies  to-day  in  ruins.  Dr.  Ezra  Abbot  was 
one  of  the  most  learned  and  skillful  exegetes  of  the  last 


366  APPENDIX 

generation,  but  the  historical  and  critical  spirit  had  not 
fully  mastered  him,  and  it  is  plain  that  he  accepted 
the  legends  connected  with  John  and  the  other  disciples 
without  due  examination.  For  myself,  were  the  ex- 
ternal argument  stronger  than  it  is,  and  if  all  and  more 
than  aU  of  Dr.  Abbot's  claims  were  allowed,  it  would 
not  change  the  conviction  to  which  I  am  brought  on 
internal  grounds.  For  it  is  my  belief  that  the  study  of 
the  Gospel  itself  and  of  its  place  in  the  historical  evolu- 
tion of  christological  thought  is  decisive  in  regard  to  the 
question  of  Johannine  authorship.  But  I  cannot  leave 
the  claims  of  Dr.  Abbot  and  others  concerning  the  evi- 
dence of  the  acquaintance  of  Justin  Martyr  and  Basilides 
and  Valentinus  with  the  fourth  Gospel  without  entering 
a  strong  demurrer.  The  effort  to  convince  myself  that 
Justin  Martyr  used  the  fourth  Gospel  has  utterly  failed, 
and  the  longer  I  have  studied  the  question,  the  clearer 
becomes  my  conviction  that  he  never  saw  it.  Great 
reliance  has  been  placed  on  the  passage  concerning  the 
new  birth.  But  if  this  was  a  quotation  from  the 
fourth  Gospel,  why  did  Justin  not  declare  it  such,  as 
he  did  in  the  case  of  quotations  from  other  gospels  used 
by  him  ?  Justin  clearly  had  in  his  hands  certain  gos- 
pels. His  quotations  from  them  are  numerous,  and  he 
always  refers  to  "  the  Memoirs  of  the  Apostles  "  as  the 
sources,  from  which  he  drew.  These  quotations  are 
apparently  from  Matthew  and  Luke  and  besides  some 
unknown  gospel,  perhaps  the  Gospel  of  the  Hebrews, 
fragments  of  which  have  been  preserved.  But  no  ex- 
tract from  the  fourth  Gospel  appears  among  them. 
When  he  recited  the  passage  concerning  the  new  birth, 
why  did  he  not  also  refer  it  to  "  The  Memoirs  of  the 
Apostles,"  if  the  fourth  Gospel  was  one  of  those  in  his 
hands?  Why  should  he  have  referred  it  directly  to 
Christ  ?     "  For  Christ  also  said."     When  we  bear  in 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  367 

mind  that  many  oral  traditions  of  Christ's  sayings  were 
floating  in  the  air  in  Justin's  day,  as  is  shown  by  say- 
ings drawn  from  such  sources  by  Justin  himself,  and 
still  later  by  Irenseus  and  others,  and  that  oral  tradition 
was  still  regarded  by  Papias,  a  contemporary  of  Justin, 
as  more  trustworthy  than  written  gospels,  and  when  we 
further  note  how  inaccurate,  as  a  quotation  from  the 
fourth  Gospel,  is  the  passage  put  by  Justin  into  Christ's 
own  lips,  it  is  much  more  easy  to  believe  that  Justin 
drew  it  from  oral  sources  than  from  a  written  gospel 
to  which  he  never  once  alludes  and  of  which  he  shows 
no  knowledge.  But  there  are  much  stronger  positive 
grounds  against  Justin's  acquaintance  with  this  Gospel. 
Surely  if  he  had  possessed  it  he  would  have  made  ample 
use  of  it  in  setting  forth  and  justifying  his  Logos  doc- 
trine which  forms  so  original  and  marked  a  feature  of 
his  writings.  On  the  contrary,  he  shows  no  knowledge 
of  the  remarkable  proem  of  the  Gospel,  and  never  alludes 
to  its  existence,  or  in  any  way  connects  his  own  Logos 
doctrine  with  it.  Nay,  further,  he  makes  it  plain  that 
his  Logos  ideas  are  drawn  directly  from  the  Platonic 
and  Stoic  philosophies.  In  fact,  the  Stoic  spermatic 
Logos  doctrine  is  the  very  foundation  of  Justin's  pecul- 
iar view,  that  all  the  ancient  sages,  such  as  Heraclitus 
and  Socrates  and  others,  had  a  part  of  the  Logos  which 
was  in  the  world  before  Christ,  and  of  which  Christ 
alone  had  complete  possession.  It  was  on  this  ground 
that  Justin  declared  such  ancient  sages  to  be  Christians 
before  Christ's  coming.  Besides,  the  differences  between 
the  Logos  doctrine  of  the  fourth  Gospel  and  that  of 
Justin,  instead  of  being  merely  superficial,  as  has  been 
urged,  are  profoundly  radical,  and  in  view  of  them  it 
is  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  believe  that  Justin  could 
have  had  the  proem  of  the  fourth  Gospel  before  him 
when  he  elaborated  his  own  Logos  christology.     Still 


358  APPENDIX 

more  difficult  is  it  to  believe  that,  if  he  had  it  in  his 
hands  and  supposed  it  to  be  Johannine,  he  could  have 
failed  to  quote  it  frequently,  so  highly  must  he  have 
regarded  its  apostolic  authority.  The  result  of  histor- 
ical investigation  then  must  be,  it  seems  to  me,  that 
Justin  did  not  borrow  his  Logos  doctrine  from  the 
fourth  Gospel,  and  that  the  doctrine  of  that  Gospel  had 
its  source  in  common  with  that  of  Justin  in  Greek 
philosophy. 

So,  in  regard  to  the  claim  made  that  the  earliest 
Gnostics,  Basilides  and  Valentinus,  quoted  from  the 
fourth  Gospel,  the  failure  to  sustain  it  is  in  my  view 
still  more  complete.  To  realize  this  one  only  needs  to 
read  carefully,  and  without  any  dogmatic  prepossessions, 
the  accounts  given  by  Irenaeus  and  Hippolytus  of  the 
different  Gnostic  doctrines.  In  doing  this  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  Irenaeus  wrote  half  a  century  after 
BasiHdes  and  Valentinus,  and  that  Hippolytus  was 
nearly  half  a  century  later  still.  The  first  thing  that 
strikes  one  is  the  fact  that  the  two  writers  are  dealing, 
not  so  much  with  individuals  as  with  schools  of  thinkers, 
and  that  the  names  of  the  chief  leaders  are  often  used 
as  synonyms  for  the  schools  of  Gnostic  speculation  that 
took  their  origin  from  them.  So  far  is  this  confusion 
of  individual  names  and  of  the  schools  that  afterwards 
assumed  them  carried,  that  singulars  and  plurals,  "  he  " 
and  "  they,"  are  made  to  follow  each  other  not  only  in 
contiguous  sentences,  but  even  in  the  same  sentence, 
showing  that  there  was  no  idea  or  purpose  of  distin- 
guishing the  original  Gnostics  from  their  later  followers, 
and  that  the  sole  intent  aU  along  was  to  state  the  gen- 
eral doctrines  of  the  various  Gnostic  sects  as  a  whole. 
Such  being  the  patent  fact,  which  one  that  runs  may 
read,  it  is  simply  preposterous  to  fix  on  a  quotation 
from  the  fourth  Gospel  which  had  been  put  into  the 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  359 

mouth  of  Basilides  by  Hippolytus,  who  wrote  nearly  a 
century  after  him,  and  to  infer  from  it  that  Basilides 
himself  had  the  Gospel  in  his  hands,  when  it  is  plain 
that  Hippolytus  is  never  distinguishing  Basilides  him- 
self from  the  school  that  assumed  his  name,  and  when 
it  is  allowed  on  all  sides  that  the  fourth  Gospel  had 
been  i7i  the  hands  of  that  school  for  a  generation  or 
more.  It  is  difficult  to  characterize  such  a  method  of 
argument,  and  I  can  only  explain  it  as  illustrating  the 
power  of  a  fixed  theological  presupposition  over  even 
scholarly  minds.  Perhaps  a  worse  case  still  is  that  of 
Resch  in  his  attempt  by  a  minute  analysis  of  the  earliest 
Christian  writings  to  glean  out  phrases  and  words  which 
seem  to  indicate  a  knowledge  and  use  of  the  fourth  Gos- 
pel. Such  a  method,  when  carried  far  enough,  might 
prove  not  only  that  Bacon  wrote  Shakespeare's  plays, 
but  that  Shakespeare  wrote  Bacon's  "Advancement  of 
Learning." 

The  conclusion,  then,  to  which  one  seems  forced  to 
come  is  that  the  date  of  the  fourth  Gospel  cannot  be 
proved  to  be  earlier  than  the  middle  of  the  second  cen- 
tury, and  it  still  remains  doubtful  whether  one  is  justi- 
fied in  assigning  a  date  even  as  early  as  that.  It  is 
quite  likely  that  the  fourth  Gospel  may  have  been 
written  several  years  before  its  appearance  in  what  is 
now  known  as  history  ;  but  if  evidence  of  it  is  lacking, 
such  a  likelihood  cannot  be  made  the  basis  of  an  as- 
sumption that  it  was  actually  so  written,  and  of  the  con- 
clusion that  John  was  the  author,  and  then  of  the  still 
further  conclusion  that  its  christology  is  apostolic  and 
an  authentic  part  of  Christ's  teaching.  It  was  one  of 
the  most  vicious  elements  of  the  old  method  of  reasoning 
on  this  question,  to  take  the  ground  that  the  traditional 
view  of  the  Johannine  authorship  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
should  be  accepted  until  its  spuriousness  was  proved. 


360  APPENDIX 

This  assumption  underlies  the  fixed  presupposition  that 
runs  all  through  the  efforts  to  prove  that  Justin  Martyr 
and  the  earliest  Gnostics  were  acquainted  with  the 
fourth  Gospel,  namely,  that  John  really  was  the  author 
of  it,  and  that  it  must  have  heen  in  their  hands.  Thus 
the  method  of  the  defenders  of  tradition  has  been  largely 
to  confine  themselves  to  "  refuting  the  arguments  which 
were  brought  forward  by  the  skeptical  critics."  But  the 
burden  of  proof  is  always  on  the  side  of  the  affirmative 
in  historical  as  truly  as  in  all  other  matters.  To  insist 
that  all  the  traditional  claims  concerning  the  fourth 
Gospel  should  be  religiously  accepted  till  they  have  been 
clearly  proved  false  is  against  the  fundamental  laws  of 
scientific  and  historical  methods  of  investigation.  It  is 
a  part  of  the  old  a  priori  deductive  method  which  has 
suffered  collapse.  But  it  may  be  said  that  such  a  scien- 
tific method  rigidly  carried  out  would  involve  the  rejec- 
tion of  almost  all  the  so-called  history  that  has  come 
down  to  us  from  the  ancient  times.  Certainly  it  has  led 
to  the  rejection  of  a  mass  of  legendary  traditions  which 
an  uncritical  age  had  allowed  to  be  mingled  with  his- 
torical facts.  But  such  a  sifting  of  legend  from  history 
does  not  destroy  history  itself  ;  rather  it  plants  all  real 
historical  events  on  clearer  and  firmer  ground.  It  is 
true  that  the  scientific  method  when  appUed  to  history 
cannot  give  us  absolute  certainty  in  regard  to  any  sup- 
posed historical  events.  All  historical  evidence  is  only 
probable ;  it  can  never  reach  demonstrative  or  necessary 
truth,  like  a  geometrical  or  algebraic  formula.  But  it 
cannot  be  inferred  from  this  that  therefore  a  mere 
historical  likelihood  can  be  accepted  as  a  historical  cer- 
tainty. The  true  meaning  of  "  probable  "  as  applied  to 
historical  evidence  is  "having  more  evidence  for  than 
against."  Everything  depends  upon  the  degree  or  weight 
of  probabihty.     There  are  high  degrees  of  probability 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  361 

that  are  practically  conclusive,  and  low  degrees  that 
have  no  weight  at  all.  A  person  accused  of  crime  is 
not  convicted  except  on  evidence  that  is,  in  legal  phrase, 
beyond  all  reasonable  doubt.  Yet  even  such  evidence 
has  led  to  the  conviction  of  innocent  persons,  because  it 
is  only  probable,  and  thus  may  fail  of  arriving  at  truth, 
—  the  more  reason,  therefore,  for  the  most  rigid  scientific 
method  of  investigation,  that  the  highest  possible  degree 
of  probability  may  be  reached.  It  is  not  enough,  then, 
that  there  is  some  degree  of  probability  in  favor  of  any 
supposed  historical  event.  The  science  of  history  de- 
mands that  the  probabilities  in  favor  of  such  an  event 
should  overbalance,  even  beyond  all  reasonable  doubt, 
the  probabilities  against  such  an  event.  This  is  the 
prime  difl&culty  with  the  evidence  for  the  early  date 
assigned  by  some  to  the  fourth  Gospel.  There  may  be 
a  low  degree  of  the  likelihood  of  such  a  date,  but  the 
probabilities  against  such  a  date  are  enormously  greater, 
so  that  the  historical  critic  is  forced  to  decide  for  the 
later  date  rather  than  the  earlier. 

It  was  another  vice  of  the  old  method  of  defending 
tradition  that  it  insisted  on  the  acceptance  of  all  tradi- 
tion as  true  until  some  other  historical  explanation  could 
be  found  that  would  supplant  it.  So  ripe  and  liberal  a 
scholar  as  Dr.  C.  R.  Gregory,  of  the  University  of  Leip- 
zig, in  a  recent  review  of  Harnach's  "  History  of  Early 
Christian  Literature  "  ^  surprises  me  by  declaring  that 
"It  is  unscientific  to  give  up  a  tradition  that  is  not 
positive  nonsense,  before  we  have  a  theory  that  has  at 
least  as  good  a  support  in  history  and  that  offers  fewer 
difficulties."  The  reviewer  applies  this  dictum  to  Har- 
nach's criticism  on  the  genuineness  of  the  first  Epistle 
of  Peter.  It  would  be  equally  applicable  to  the  Johan- 
nine  question.  According  to  Dr.  Gregory,  the  tradition 
1  American  Journal  of  Theology,  July,  1898. 


362  APPENDIX 

that  the  Apostle  John  wrote  the  fourth  Gospel  should 
be  accepted  until  some  other  theory  or  explanation  of 
the  authorship  of  that  Gospel  can  be  offered  that  is  more 
acceptable  and  presents  fewer  difficulties.  But  such  a 
principle,  when  applied  to  historical  investigation,  would 
utterly  overthrow  the  whole  scientific  method.  It  makes 
it  the  duty  of  the  historical  critic  to  provide  a  good  his- 
torical substitute  for  every  myth  and  legend  and  unhis- 
torical  tradition  that  he  finds.  A  heavy  task  surely! 
It  seems,  then,  that  the  historical  student  should  accept 
the  historicity  of  Constantine's  vision  of  the  cross  in  the 
sky  at  midday,  with  the  Latin  words,  hoc  vince,  blazing 
beside  it,  until  he  can  satisfactorily  explain  the  origin 
of  the  legend,  and  decide  whether  it  was  a  legendary 
growth,  having  its  source  in  some  natural  phenomenon, 
or  a  pure  legend  from  the  beginning,  and  not  only  de- 
cide between  the  two  explanations,  but  also  give  satis- 
factory reasons  therefor.  How  much  room  would  there 
be  for  the  exercise  of  historical  criticism  imder  such 
conditions  ?  If  a  rational  historical  explanation  of  all 
the  mythological  and  legendary  growths  that  have  fast- 
ened themselves  on  historical  events  must  be  given  be- 
fore such  growths  can  be  cut  away  by  the  critic's  knife, 
then  his  work  is  at  an  end.  The  growth  of  legend  is  as 
spontaneous  and  as  lawless  as  the  growth  of  weeds  in 
spring.  The  only  fact  that  is  historically  clear  concern- 
ing the  story  of  Constantine's  vision  of  a  supernatural 
cross,  with  its  attendant  hoc  vince,  is  that  it  is  a  legend 
lacking  any  historical  foundation.  Beyond  this  histori- 
cal critics  are  utterly  at  sea.  Neander,  for  example, 
suggests  four  different  explanations  or  theories  of  the 
story,  but  does  not  decide  between  them  any  further 
than  to  throw  out  the  view  that  accepts  its  historicity. 
This  is  as  far  as  the  critic  need  go.  He  cannot  be 
expected  to  explain  how  a  legend  began  to  grow.     So 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  363 

in  the  case  of  the  question  concerning  the  Johannine 
authorship  of  the  fourth  Gospel,  the  problem  is  whether 
the  Apostle  John  wrote  it.  Who  actually  wrote  it,  sup- 
posing John  did  not,  is  an  entirely  different  question, 
and  does  not  directly  concern  the  historical  critic.  Dr. 
Gregory  requires  him  to  accept  the  tradition  of  Johan- 
nine authorship  until  he  can  show  who  did  write  it,  if 
John  did  not,  or  at  least  satisfactorily  explain  how  it 
came  into  being.  But  this  is  an  eversion  of  the  scien- 
tific inductive  process.  The  only  vital  question  induc- 
tively is  whether  there  is  convincing  evidence  that  the 
Gospel  was  written  by  John.  When  the  inductive  method 
has  found  an  answer  affirmatively  or  negatively,  the 
critical  work  is  done.  Dr.  Gregory,  here  following  the 
old  method  of  dealing  with  the  problem,  has  confounded 
two  distinct  questions  together,  as  if  the  historical  settle- 
ment of  the  one  involved  also  the  settlement  of  the 
other. 

Before  we  pass  to  our  final  division  of  the  subject,  it 
may  be  well  to  compare  more  directly  the  two  divisions 
already  considered,  and  note  their  relations  to  each 
other.  Such  a  comparison  may  leave  the  result  to 
which  we  have  arrived  more  clear  in  the  mind.  The 
historical  facts  concerning  the  Apostle  John  left  him 
still  in  Palestine,  a  rather  inconspicuous  member  of  the 
twelve  Apostles,  with  a  purely  Galilean  background  and 
environment,  and  without  any  evidence  of  rabbinic  or 
Greek  culture;  and  all  the  historical  light  accessible 
makes  it  highly  probable  that  his  death  occurred  soon 
after  A.  d.  70,  if  not  some  years  before.  Turning  to 
the  fourth  Gospel,  we  find  a  writing  that  is  dominated  by 
a  distinct  dogmatic  motive,  plainly  the  work  of  a  Greek 
scholar  versed  in  the  deepest  speculations  of  Greek  phi- 
losophy, and  representing  an  evolution  of  christological 
thought  that  marks  it  as  a  product  of  about  the  middle 


364  APPENDIX 

of  the  second  century.  This  result  of  internal  evidence 
corresponds  to  the  date  of  its  first  appearance  in  his- 
tory; for  even  the  conservative  critics  do  not  carry  it 
back  of  A.  D.  125,  and  the  whole  tendency  of  criticism 
is  to  place  it  considerably  later. 

Let  us  now  bring  these  two  classes  of  facts  together 
and  see  how  they  fit  each  other.  An  illustration  will 
help  us.  Several  years  ago  a  young  man  was  tried  in 
New  Haven  for  murder,  and  was  convicted  on  this 
single  bit  of  evidence.  A  knife  with  the  blade  broken 
was  found  in  his  pocket.  The  broken  end  was  found 
in  the  body  of  the  victim.  The  two  pieces  of  the  blade 
were  produced  in  court,  and  under  a  microscope  there 
was  shown  an  exact  fitting  of  them  together.  Suppose 
it  had  been  revealed  by  the  microscope  that  though 
there  was  a  considerable  closeness  of  correspondence,  it 
was  not  complete,  the  prisoner  would  have  been  ac- 
quitted at  once.  It  was  the  exactness  of  correspond- 
ence that  fixed  his  guilt.  Any  want  of  exactness 
would  have  so  far  testified  to  his  innocence.  Now  how 
is  it  with  the  relation  of  the  character  and  history  of 
the  Apostle  John,  and  the  character  and  history  of  the 
fourth  Gospel?  What  does  our  historical  microscope 
say  ?  Does  it  not  emphatically  declare  that  the  two 
supposed  parts  of  a  single  blade  cannot  be  fitted  to- 
gether ?  There  can  be  but  one  answer.  How  can  the 
Aramaic  "  unlearned  "  character  of  John  be  made  to  fit 
into  the  highly  learned  Greek  philosophical  character 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  ?  How  can  the  historical  limit  of 
John's  life  be  made  to  cover  a  period  of  fifty  or  seventy- 
five  years  and  fit  into  the  date  of  the  Gospel  ?  It  may 
be  comparatively  easy,  by  means  of  reliance  on  tradi- 
tion to  establish  a  loose  connection  between  them,  but 
the  microscope  reveals  historical  gaps  that  no  sophistry 
can   hide.     Our   illustration  also   helps  us   to  see   the 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  365 

sophistical  character  of  Dr.  Gregory's  dictum.  Sup- 
pose, in  the  case  referred  to,  the  broken  piece  had  failed 
to  fit  that  found  in  the  prisoner's  pocket,  and  that  the 
attorney  for  the  state  had  urged  that  before  the  accused 
could  be  cleared  the  defense  should  show  to  what  knife 
the  broken  piece  belonged.  What  would  have  been  the 
quick  judgment  of  the  court  ?  A  man  tried  for  murder 
is  not  compelled  to  show  who  committed  the  murder  in 
order  to  prove  that  he  did  not  commit  it  himself.  No 
more  is  the  historical  critic  compelled  to  show  who  wrote 
the  fourth  Gospel  in  order  to  decide  on  the  evidence 
that  John  did  not  write  it. 

III.  The  third  division  of  our  subject,  namely :  when 
and  how  the  tradition  of  the  Johannine  authorship  of 
the  fourth  Gospel  arose,  may  be  dispatched  with  com- 
parative brevity.  Theophilus,  who  was  the  first  to 
quote  from  the  fourth  Gospel  as  such,  was  also  the  first 
to  name  John  as  its  author.  Irenaeus,  perhaps  a  little 
later,  was  the  first  to  describe  our  four  gospels  as  written 
by  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and  John.  This  was  in  the 
last  part  of  the  second  century.  It  would  seem  that  the 
name  of  John  was  attached  to  the  Gospel  not  long  after 
its  appearance,  if  not  at  once.  Assuming,  as  we  now  do, 
that  sufficient  historical  evidence  is  wanting  for  the 
Johannine  tradition,  the  question  arises,  how  it  came  to 
be  attributed  to  the  Apostle.  Of  course  no  conclusive 
answer  can  be  given.  But  there  are  two  views  that 
may  be  taken  of  it.  Either  the  writer,  whoever  he 
was,  assumed  the  name  of  John  the  Apostle  in  order  to 
gain  for  his  work  the  authority  of  an  apostolic  name,  or 
the  Gospel  may  have  been  written  by  another  John, 
namely,  John  the  Elder,  to  whom  Papias  refers  as  one 
of  his  contemporaries,  who  became  confounded  with  the 
Apostle.  This  last  view  has  in  its  favor  the  fact  that 
these  two  Johns  whom  Papias  so  clearly  distinguished 


366  APPENDIX 

were  actually  confounded  by  IrenaBus,  and  it  is  quite 
supposable  that  the  confusion  started  by  him  may  have 
been  extended  to  others.  It  is  on  this  ground  that 
Harnack  rules  out  Irenaeus  as  a  credible  witness  on  the 
Johannine  question,  and  concludes  that  the  fourth  Gos- 
pel was  written  by  "  John  the  Elder."  But  when  it  is 
considered  how  common  was  the  custom  in  that  period, 
especially  among  the  Alexandrian  Jews,  to  write  anony- 
mously and  to  seek  the  authority  of  some  illustrious 
name,  it  is  quite  as  easy  to  look  in  this  direction  for  the 
true  explanation.  Let  it  be  remembered  that  the  Syn- 
optic gospels  are  anonymous,  though  ascribed  by  tradi- 
tion to  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke.  The  same  is  true  of 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  attributed  to  Paul,  and  of 
the  Apocalypse  directly  ascribed  to  John  in  the  intro- 
ductory verses,  though  what  John  is  not  clear.  It 
should  not,  then,  cause  surprise  that  a  gospel  should  ap- 
pear anonymously  and  yet  under  the  assumed  name  of 
the  Apostle  John.  Authorship,  editorship,  authenticity, 
genuineness,  anonymity,  and  pseudonymity  were  much 
more  elastic  words  in  those  days  than  now,  and  the  law 
of  ethics  in  relation  to  them  was  much  less  strict.  The 
great  object  of  the  Alexandrian  Jewish  writers,  and 
equally  so  of  the  Christian  writers,  was  to  secure  as 
high  authority  as  possible  for  their  works.  This  was 
especially  true  among  the  Christians  in  the  second  cen- 
tury and  after.  The  question  that  decided  whether  a 
gospel  or  epistle  or  other  writing  should  go  into  the 
growing  canon  of  sacred  scripture  was  whether  or  not 
it  was  written  by  one  of  the  Apostolic  circle.  If  the 
new  gospel  was  to  win  such  a  place  it  must  have  some 
apostolic  sponsor.  The  traditions  that  had  been  grow- 
ing around  the  Apostle  John  might  have  recommended 
him  as  a  suitable  person  to  represent  the  peculiar  mys- 
ticism of  this  Gospel.     Legend  had  distinguished  him 


THE  JOHANNINE  PROBLEM  367 

as  the  Apostle  of  Love.  This  view  explains,  perhaps 
better  than  any  other,  the  curious  absence  of  John's 
name  from  the  Gospel.  The  other  apostles  are  men- 
tioned by  name  again  and  again,  but  John  is  conspic- 
uous by  his  absence  until  the  very  end.  Then  he  mys- 
teriously appears,  not  by  name,  but  as  "the  disciple 
whom  Jesus  loved,"  or  "another  disciple,"  or  "that 
other  disciple,"  or  "  the  other  disciple."  Why,  we  can- 
not help  asking,  all  this  unwillingness  to  call  this  disci- 
ple by  his  name  ?  Was  it  modesty  on  the  part  of  John 
himself,  supposing  he  was  the  author  ?  A  strange  mod- 
esty, indeed,  that  which  could  not  allow  him  to  appear 
under  his  name,  and  yet  could  allow  him  to  describe 
himself  as  "  the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved,"  and  intro- 
duce scenes  in  which  he  was  highly  distinguished  above 
all  the  other  disciples.  The  delicacy  which  some  have 
discovered  here  I  cannot  see.  But  if  some  unknown 
writer  wished  to  assume  John's  name,  by  way  of  indirect 
suggestion,  the  singular  method  adopted  is  at  least  not 
wholly  unnatural,  and  at  present  I  lean  to  this  view. 
Still,  when  one  realizes  how  easily  in  these  times  legends 
grew,  of  authorship  as  of  other  events,  one  is  ready  to 
conclude  that  after  all  the  probabilities  are  not  so  slight 
that  the  connection  of  John's  name  with  the  fourth 
Gospel  was  the  mere  result  of  chance  legendary  tradi- 
tion, which,  once  started,  no  matter  how,  speedily  grew 
widespread  and  unanimous.  Such  a  legend  is  no  more 
surprising  than  the  other  legends  that  finally  gathered 
around  his  name. 


368  APPENDIX 

B.    A    CRITICISM  OF   PROFESSOR   A.  V.  G.  ALLEN'S 
"CONTINUITY  OF  CHRISTIAN  THOUGHT." 

In  my  account  of  Augustine's  theological  position,  on 
page  69,  I  say :  "  Thus  the  Stoic,  New  Platonic  imma- 
nence, with  Augustine,  supplants  the  Platonico- Aristo- 
telian and  Athanasian  transcendence."  Professor  AUen, 
in  his  "  Continuity  of  Christian  Thought,"  assumes  the 
very  opposite  of  this  statement  as  the  keynote  of  his 
whole  book.  In  his  Introduction  he  says :  '^  The  Augus- 
tinian  theology  rests  upon  the  transcendence  of  Deity 
as  its  controlling  principle,  and  at  every  point  appears 
as  an  inferior  rendering  of  the  earlier  interpretation  of 
the  Christian  faith."  What  this  earlier  interpretation 
is,  he  sets  forth  in  the  chapter  on  the  Greek  theology. 
Athanasius,  he  declares,  "labors  to  retain  the  Stoic 
principle  of  immanent  Deity  without  confounding  God 
with  the  world.  Like  his  predecessors,  Clement  and 
Origen,  he  builds  his  thought  on  the  divine  immanence, 
not  on  the  transcendence  of  God."  Elsewhere  he 
speaks  of  Athanasius  as  "  reproducing  the  teaching  of 
Greek  philosophy,  and  more  especially  that  of  the  Stoic 
school."  The  only  evidence  that  Professor  Allen  gives 
for  this  assumption  is  Eusebius's  statement  that  Pan- 
taenus,  whose  pupil  Clement  was,  "  had  been  first  dis- 
ciplined in  the  philosophical  principles  of  those  called 
Stoics."  PantaBnus  himself  is  scarcely  more  than  a  tra- 
dition, and  nothing  further  is  known  of  Clement's  rela- 
tion to  him.  There  is  not  a  single  explicit  allusion  to 
Pantsenus  in  Clement's  voluminous  writings.  The  whole 
theory  that  Clement,  Origen,  and  Athanasius  drew  their 
philosophical  ideas  especially  from  the  Stoics,  and  thus 
developed  a  doctrine  of  divine  immanence  in  the  world 
in  place  of  the  Platonic  doctrine  of  the  divine  tran- 
scendence, is  utterly  without  historical  or  philosophical 


CRITICISM  OF  PROF.  A.  V.  G.  ALLEN    369 

foundation.  How  Professor  Allen  could  have  been 
brought  to  it  is  to  me  a  puzzle.  He  seems  to  have  been 
carried  away  with  the  idea  that  modern  thought  is  re- 
turning along  the  lines  of  the  new  science  to  the  ancient 
conception  of  God.  This  is  the  note  that  he  continually 
strikes.  Modern  theology,  he  thinks,  is  reacting  from 
the  transcendental  dualism  of  Augustine  to  the  imma- 
nence of  the  Greek  Fathers,  Origen  and  Athanasius. 
It  is  a  pleasant  dream,  but  has  no  counterpart  in  fact. 
Origen  is  indeed  once  more  in  the  ascendant;  this  is 
not,  however,  on  account  of  his  trinitarian  doctrine,  but 
because  of  the  nobleness  of  his  character,  his  grand 
spirit  of  tolerance,  and  his  scholarly  and  spiritualizing 
method  of  dealing  with  truth. 

As  to  Professor  Allen's  assumption  that  Augustine 
held  to  a  dualistic  doctrine  of  transcendence,  it  is  as 
fallacious  as  the  counter  assimiption  concerning  Origen 
and  Athanasius.  Origen  was  a  philosophical  Platonist, 
and  so  was  Clement  before  him  and  Athanasius  after 
him.  Their  whole  Logos  doctrine,  which  Professor 
Allen  seems  to  misunderstand  entirely,  was  based,  as  we 
have  seen,  on  the  Platonic  dualism.  Augustine,  on  the 
other  hand,  drew  his  ideas  from  New  Platonic  or  Stoic 
sources.  A  double  confusion  runs  through  Professor 
Allen's  book.  First,  he  confounds  two  kinds  of  divine 
immanence,  a  theistic,  and  a  pantheistic.  Plato  and  the 
Greek  Fathers  held  to  a  theistic  immanence  of  God  in 
the  world,  that  is,  a  doctrine  of  divine  providence  and 
agency.  But  their  dualism  and  doctrine  of  God's  tran- 
scendence kept  them  from  pantheistic  tendencies.  The 
doctrine  of  Augustine  also  fell  short  of  strict  pantheistic 
inmaanence.  He  did  not  wholly  confound  God  with 
nature.  But  his  view  of  God's  efficient  operation  in 
nature  was  thoroughly  Stoic  in  its  tendency,  as  we  have 
seen,  leading  to  an  elimination  of  strict  second  causes 


370  APPENDIX 

and  of  miracles  as  supernatural  infringements  of  natural 
law.  Nothing  could  be  further  from  the  truth  than 
Professor  Allen's  statement  that  Augustine's  theology- 
is  "  built  upon  the  ruling  principle  that  God  is  outside 
the  world  and  not  within,"  and  that  "  His  being  would 
be  complete  without  the  creation  or  himianity  or  the 
eternal  Son."  Neander  in  his  "History  of  Christian 
Dogmas  "  puts  it  rightly.  "  Augustine's  conceptions  of 
the  relation  between  the  creative  and  upholding  agency 
of  God  were  determined  by  his  idea  of  creation.  Cre- 
ation was  not  to  be  thought  of  as  a  temporal  act,  begin- 
ning and  ending,  but  as  ever  continuous ;  hence  God's 
upholding  agency  came  to  be  regarded  as  a  continued 
creation.  His  religious  consciousness  led  him  to  the 
same  view,  by  giving  him  the  idea  of  the  perpetual, 
absolute  dependence  of  the  creature  on  God  in  opposi- 
tion to  the  deistical  notion  of  the  relation  of  God  to  the 
world."  This  view  of  the  creation  as  without  a  tem- 
poral beginning  is  distinctly  New  Platonic  and  monistic, 
and  is  closely  related  to  the  Stoic  pantheistic  doctrine 
of  the  divine  immanence.  The  only  thing  that  saves 
Augustine  from  complete  pantheism  is  his  view,  drawn 
from  the  Scriptures,  that  the  world  is  a  free  creation  of 
God,  though  not  in  time,  while  the  New  Platonic  and 
Stoic  pantheism  makes  the  world  a  necessary  evolution 
from  deity.  That  Augustine's  theology  was  "  built  upon 
the  ruling  principle  that  God  is  outside  the  worlds  and 
not  within"  as  Professor  Allen  declares,  is  whoUy 
foreign  to  Augustine's  point  of  view,  which  started  from 
his  New  Platonic  Monism  rather  than  from  the  Platonic 
Dualism.  So  far  from  holding  such  a  deistic  view, 
Augustine  rather  made  the  world  and  mankind  to  be 
the  essential  expression  of  God's  eternal  nature  and  the 
theatre  of  his  unending  working.  Such  was  his  inter- 
pretation of  "  My  Father  worketh  hitherto."    Augustine 


CRITICISM  OF  PROF.  A.  V.  G.  ALLEN    371 

even  found,  as  we  shall  see,  in  creation  itself  and  in 
man,  illustrations  and  reflections  of  the  divine  Trinity, 
showing  his  conception  of  the  intimate  connection  of  God 
and  his  universe.  What  Professor  Allen  attributes  to 
Augustine  quite  accurately  expresses  the  dualistic  tran- 
scendence of  Athanasius.  How  Professor  Allen  could 
find  in  Athanasius's  treatises,  "  Contra  Gentes  "  and  "  De 
Incarnatione  Verbi,"  to  which  he  refers,  "  the  Stoic  doc- 
trine of  the  divine  immanence,"  is  to  me  simply  inex- 
plicable. How  can  the  Stoic  pantheistic  immanence  be 
drawn  from  such  a  passage  as  this  ("De  Incarnatione 
Verbi,"  17)  :  "  He  is  at  once  distinct  in  being  (e/cros  Kar* 
ova-Lav)  from  the  universe,  and  present  in  all  things  by 
his  own  power,  —  giving  order  to  all  things,  and  over 
all  and  in  all  revealing  his  own  providence,  and  giving 
life  to  each  thing  and  all  things,  including  the  whole 
without  being  included,  but  being  in  his  own  Father 
alone  whoUy  and  in  every  respect,"  —  where  the  differ- 
ence between  a  theistic  Platonic  immanence,  which  is  in 
complete  harmony  with  the  Platonic  dualism,  and  the 
Stoic  pantheistic  immanence,  is  accurately  drawn.  Or 
take  a  passage  in  "  Contra  Gentes,"  40,  where  there  is  a 
distinct  allusion  apparently  to  the  Stoic  view :  "  But  by 
Word  I  mean,  not  that  which  is  involved  and  inherent 
in  aU  things  created,  which  some  are  wont  to  call  the 
seminal  principle,  —  but  I  mean  the  living  and  powerful 
Word  of  the  good  God,  the  God  of  the  Universe,  the 
very  Word  which  is  God,  who  while  different  from 
things  that  are  made,  and  from  all  Creation,  is  the  one 
own  word  of  the  good  Father  who  by  his  own  provi- 
dence ordered  and  illumines  this  universe."  By  the 
"seminal  principle"  Athanasius  means  the  Stoic  doc- 
trine of  the  o-n-epfiaTLKos  Xoyos,  which  is  eternally  imma- 
nent as  a  vital  force  in  the  world,  and  in  no  possible 
sense  separable  from  it.     Athanasius  in  his  writings 


372  APPENDIX 

twice  refers  to  the  Stoics  and  their  immanent  doctrine, 
in  one  case  (Second  Oration  against  the  Arians,  11) 
charging  his  Arian  opponents  with  a  Stoic  leaning,  and 
in  the  other  case  (Fourth  Oration  against  the  Ai'ians, 
13)  charging  his  Sabellian  opponents  with  a  similar 
leaning.  The  stout  dualism  of  Athanasius  led  him  to  a 
strict  acceptance  of  a  creation  in  time,  involving  the 
view  that  "  God's  being  would  be  complete  without  the 
creation,"  the  very  thing  which  Professor  Allen  applies 
to  Augustine,  misrepresenting  him  entirely,  as  Neander 
shows.  Professor  Allen  does  injustice  to  Arius  as  well 
as  to  Augustine,  treating  the  dualistic  view  of  God  and 
creation,  which  he  attributes  to  both,  as  "  Jewish  Deism." 
Arius  and  Augustine  were  as  far  apart  as  the  two  poles, 
as  I  have  already  shown.  Arius  was  a  philosophical 
dualist,  agreeing  with  Athanasias  perfectly  in  his  Pla- 
tonic transcendence.  The  real  issue  between  Arius  and 
Athanasias  was  not  whether  there  are  two  worlds,  sep- 
arated by  an  essential  chasm,  but  to  which  of  the  two 
worlds  Christ  belonged.  I  am  not  quite  sure  that  I 
understand  Professor  Allen's  view  of  New  Platonism. 
He  must  be  aware  of  the  fact  that  Augustine's  whole 
theology  is  steeped  in  New  Platonic  thought.  But  he 
seems  to  regard  New  Platonism  as  a  refined  form  of 
transcendent  dualism,  instead  of  being  what  it  actually 
is,  a  complete  system  of  pantheistic  thought  combined 
with  an  evolutionary  mediating  principle  which  con- 
nects it  with  Platonism,  while  losing  sight  entirely  of 
the  dualism  of  Plato  himself.  Augustine,  as  I  have 
said,  is  only  saved  from  pantheism  by  his  insistence  on 
God's  personality,  and  on  the  eternally  active  efficiency 
of  God  in  the  world.  But  his  thought  runs  as  far 
toward  pantheism  as  it  is  possible  for  it  to  do  without 
deserting  his  theistic  starting-point. 

This  misunderstanding  of  Augustine's  general  posi- 


CRITICISM  OF  PROF.  A.  V.  G.  ALLEN    373 

tion  leads  Professor  Allen  into  further  confusion  as  to 
Augustine's  doctrine  of  sin  and  moral  evil.  Augustine 
was  no  Manicliean,  as  Professor  Allen  charges.  His  con- 
version from  the  Manichean  dualism  to  the  monistic 
New  Platonism  was  complete.  His  "  Confessions  "  gives 
the  whole  story.  To  he  sure,  Augustine  draws  the  line 
sharply  hetween  actual  sin  and  holiness,  and  carries  the 
division  into  the  eternal  state.  But  he  did  not  treat 
evil  as  a  positive  principle.  On  this  point  he  was  thor- 
oughly New  Platonic  and  Stoic.  "  Sin,"  he  declares, 
"  is  not  a  substance,  but  only  a  defect  of  substance."  It 
has  only  a  negative  existence.  So  afraid  was  he  of  a 
Manichean  dualistic  conception  of  sin  that  he  would  not 
allow  that  the  hereditary  sinfulness  and  corruption  of 
nature  which  passed  from  parent  to  child  was  itself  a 
substantial  element  of  nature,  but  he  declared  that  it 
was  merely  a  quality  or  accident  of  nature,  as  if  such  a 
quality  or  property  of  nature  were  not  necessarily  a 
substantial  and  inherent  part  of  it.  When  all  the  qual- 
ities or  attributes  of  a  nature  or  substance  are  taken 
away,  what  is  left  ?  New  Platonism  and  Stoicism  also 
holds  that  there  is  but  one  eternal  substance  in  the  uni- 
verse. Matter,  sin,  and  all  evil  are  but  modifications 
of  this  one  substance,  having  no  positive,  independent 
existence.  Augustine  held  the  same  philosophical  view. 
So  for  him  sin  could  have  no  substantive  existence. 
Good  only  was  substantial.  Sin  was  only  a  falling 
away  from  good.  This,  however,  is  on  the  straight  road 
to  a  monistic  pantheism,  and  utterly  away  from  dualism, 
which  allows  a  positive  material  world  and  an  equally 
positive  moral  evil. 

Professor  Allen  also  gives  a  wrong  view  of  Augus- 
tine's doctrine  of  grace.  He  treats  it  as  dualistic, 
involving  the  necessity  of  external  means,  such  as 
sacraments,  as  if  God  could  not  act  directly  on  the  soul. 


374  APPENDIX 

He  also  declares  that  the  Greek  theology  rested  more  in 
its  doctrine  of  grace  on  the  divine  inunanence,  making 
the  mediatorial  mission  of  Christ  the  great  source  of 
gracious  influence.  I  must  dissent  entirely  from  this 
view.  The  Greek  church  held  to  sacramental  means  of 
grace  quite  as  strongly  as  the  Latin.  In  fact,  the  whole 
later  Latin  system  of  sacraments  was  borrowed  from 
the  Greeks.  It  is  true  that  Augustine  accepted  this 
traditional  system  ;  but  his  doctrine  of  grace  was  wholly 
monistic.  He  viewed  grace  as  a  direct  exercise  of 
God's  efficiency  upon  the  individual  soul.  The  means 
of  grace  were  secondary  and  might  be  dispensed  with. 
Augustine's  doctrine  of  grace  was  in  close  relation  with 
his  doctrine  of  nature  and  miracle.  God  is  the  direct 
efficient  cause  of  all  things  in  the  realm  of  spirit  as  well 
as  in  that  of  nature.  Regeneration  is  as  much  the  result 
of  such  divine  efficiency  as  creation  or  miracle.  In  a 
remarkable  passage  ("  De  Gen.  ad  Lit."  ix.  18)  he  states 
this  directly.  Unfolding  at  length  his  theory  of  miracle 
as  simply  a  special  operation  of  divine  causation  "  by 
which  He  manages  as  He  wills  the  natures  that  He 
constituted  as  He  chose,"  he  adds,  "  and  there  is  the 
grace  by  which  sinners  are  saved."  The  whole  passage 
shows  that  Augustine  regarded  the  action  of  grace  on 
the  soul  as  the  miraculous  result  of  direct  divine  agency. 
This  is  very  far  from  sacramental  dualism.  Some  color 
of  truth  is  given  to  Professor  Allen's  theory  in  the  de- 
velopment of  the  external  church  system  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  But  this  was  the  effect  of  the  universal  igno- 
rance and  superstition  that  reigned ;  and,  moreover,  it 
had  its  birth,  not  in  the  West,  but  in  the  East,  the  ori- 
ginal home  of  Christianity. 

I  should  not  feel  called  to  make  these  strictures  on  a 
book  that  has  many  excellent  qualities,  were  it  not  that  its 
fundamental  assumptions,  which  I  regard  as  wholly  false 


CRITICISM  OF  PROF.  A.  V.  G.  ALLEN    375 

and  misleading,  are  being  accepted  in  certain  quarters 
as  true,  apparently  on  Professor  Ailen's  authority. 
The  influence  of  this  book  has  been  singularly  perva- 
sive, and  its  theory  of  Greek  Athanasian  immanence 
and  of  Latin  Augustinian  dualistic  transcendence  is  still 
employed  by  writers,  as  if  it  were  historically  true. 
Dr.  John  Fiske  in  his  book  on  "  The  Idea  of  God  "  made 
it  the  historical  key  of  his  whole  line  of  thought,  and 
plainly  drew  it  from  Professor  Allen,  quoting  from  him 
in  extenso.  It  seems  strange,  to  one  acquainted  with  the 
writings  of  Athanasius  and  Augustine,  to  have  Athana- 
sius  described  as  holding  that  God  was  "  immanent  in 
the  universe  and  eternally  appearing  through  natural 
laws,"  when  the  truth  is  that  Athanasius  held  that 
the  universe  and  its  laws  were  created  in  time,  whereas 
God  himself  existed  from  eternity  in  the  transcendent 
ideal  world ;  and,  if  possible,  stiU  more  strange  to  have 
Augustine  described  as  so  completely  in  the  power  of 
"  Gnostic  thought "  as  to  "  depict  God  as  a  crudely  an- 
thropomorphic being  far  removed  from  the  universe 
and  accessible  only  through  the  mediating  offices  of  an 
organized  church."  Even  Dr.  Fiske's  new  book, 
"  Through  Nature  to  God,"  contains  the  same  false  read- 
ing of  history ;  nor  is  he  without  good  company.  Profes- 
sor Allen  evidently  has  a  large  English  following.  Rev. 
J.  B.  Heard,  in  the  preface  to  his  Hulsean  Lectures 
for  1892  on  "  Alexandrian  and  Carthaginian  Theology 
Contrasted,"  relates  the  "  joyful  discovery  "  he  made,  by 
reading  Professor  Allen's  book,  "  that  the  so-called  new 
theology  of  modern  thinkers  was  nothing  more  than  a 
fresh  draught  of  the  oldest  of  aU  theologies."  The 
lectures  are  amazing  reading.  Augustine  is  described 
as  "  steeped  in  dualism  long  after  he  had  shaken  off  his 
early  Manicheanism."  "  God  was  external  to  his  works, 
the  transcendent  Lord  of  the  universe,  who  could  only 


376  APPENDIX 

action  the  finite  through  some  medium  or  channel  which 
He  chose  to  personify  as  *  grace.'  "  It  would  be  difficult 
to  misstate  Augustine's  real  doctrine  more  completely. 
"  Grace  "  with  Augustine  was  no  instrumental,  sacra- 
mental "  medium  or  channel "  of  God's  efficiency,  but 
that  efficiency  itself,  acting  directly  and  immanently  on 
the  soul.  Nor  has  the  leaven  of  Professor  Allen's  book 
yet  ceased  to  work.  The  Hulsean  Lectures  for  1899,  by 
Rev.  J.  M.  Wilson,  on  "  The  Gospel  of  the  Atonement," 
just  issued  from  the  press,  adopts  the  same  theory. 
"  Two  types  of  theology  "  are  described,  "  that  of  the 
Greek  and  that  of  the  Latin  Fathers."  "  The  funda- 
mental and  dominant  note  of  the  one  is  the  divine  in- 
dwelling, that  of  the  other  is  the  divine  transcendence." 
It  is  pleasant  to  hear  one  true  note  struck  from  Oxford 
itself.  Rev.  Aubrey  Moore,  in  "  Lux  Mundi,"  page  83, 
called  attention  to  the  mistake  made  by  Dr.  Fiske, 
tracing  it  to  Dr.  Allen's  book.  He  truly  says :  "  It  is 
almost  incredible  to  any  one  who  has  read  any  of 
Augustine's  writings,  that,  according  to  this  view,  he 
has  to  play  the  role  of  the  unintelligent  and  unphilo- 
sophical  deist  who  thinks  of  God  as  ^  a  crudely  anthro- 
pomorphic being  far  removed  from  the  universe  and 
accessible  only  through  the  mediating  office  of  an  or- 
ganized church,'  "  quoting  Dr.  Fiske's  language  already 
given. 

I  will  only  add  that  I  am  compelled  to  believe  that 
the  TTpcuTov  \j/ev8o<i  of  Professor  Allen  and  his  associates  is 
a  failure  to  apprehend  the  real  character  of  the  Greek 
Logos  doctrine,  which  is  based  on  the  Platonic  dual- 
ism and  transcendence.  The  Logos  or  Son  of  God  was 
regarded  by  Athanasius  as  a  transcendent  Being  who 
entered  this  lower  world  through  the  medium  of  a 
human  nature  in  order  to  bridge  the  chasm  between  the 
transcendent  world  from  which  he  came  and  the  created 


PROFESSOR  PFLEIDERER'S  VIEW        377 

world  of  time.  The  incarnation,  however,  did  not 
change  the  Logos  from  a  transcendent  being  to  an  im- 
manent being.  His  immanence  was  only  in  his  human 
life,  not  in  any  change  of  his  divine  nature.  If  I  under- 
stand Professor  Allen,  he  supposes  the  Logos  must  be 
an  immanent  being  by  virtue  of  his  incarnation ;  which 
is  not  the  doctrine  of  the  Greek  theology  at  all.  See 
Erdmann's  "  History  of  Philosophy,"  vol.  i.  pp.  274-276, 
for  an  account  of  Augustine's  immanent  pantheistic 
tendency,  and  of  his  theory  of  direct  efficient  grace. 
Also,  see  Schwegler's  "  Handbook  of  the  History  of  Phi- 
losophy," p.  143,  for  an  explanation  of  the  monistic 
character  of  Christian  Scholasticism,  with  the  result 
**  that  Monism  has  remained  the  character  and  the  fun- 
damental tendency  of  the  whole  of  modern  philosophy." 


C.   PROFESSOR  PFLEIDERER'S  ARTICLE  IN  THE 
"NEW  WORLD." 

I  have  assumed  the  genuineness  of  the  words  here 
attributed  to  Christ  (see  p.  290)  ;  but  I  am  in  sympathy 
with  the  view  taken  of  the  passage  by  Professor  Pflei- 
derer  in  an  article  on  "  Jesus'  foreknowledge  of  his  suffer- 
ings and  death,"  in  the  "  New  World,"  September,  1899. 
Professor  Pfleiderer  gives  quite  convincing  reasons  for 
doubting  whether  Christ  actually  said  the  words  "  give 
his  life  a  ransom  for  many,"  as  well  as  the  words  in  the 
Synoptic  account  of  the  last  supper  in  which  Christ  con- 
nects the  supper  with  his  death.  He  holds  that  these 
passages  are  essentially  Pauline,  and  are  the  result  of 
"  later  dogmatic  reflection  on  the  death  of  Jesus  as  a 
means  of  redemption,"  and  he  shows  that  the  Pauline 
doctrine  of  a  "  substitutional  atoning  sacrifice  "  is  "  quite 
remote  from  the  circle  of  thought  of  Jesus  himseK." 


378  APPENDIX 

"Jesus  everywhere  made  the  forgiveness  of  sins  de- 
pendent on  the  penitent  and  humble  disposition  of  men, 
together  with  their  own  willingness  to  forgive,  without 
anywhere  intimating  that  it  presupposed,  as  a  condition, 
a  preceding  propitiation  of  God  by  a  substitutional 
atonement.  The  parable  of  the  prodigal  son  is,  in  this 
respect,  very  instructive."  The  reader  will  perceive 
how  closely  in  accord  Pfleiderer  is  with  my  own  views. 
His  article  appeared  after  the  twelfth  chapter  of  this 
book  was  written. 

In  general  I  would  further  say  that  when  we  consider 
how  many  plain  interpolations,  not  only  of  single  words 
or  clauses,  but  of  whole  passages,  have  been  brought  to 
light  and  properly  excluded  from  the  New  Testament 
in  consequence  of  recent  critical  investigations,  it  ought 
not  to  be  regarded  as  anything  strange,  should  further 
interpolations  be  found  even  of  a  radical  character. 
Suppose  a  fresh  Greek  manuscript  of  the  gospels  were 
to  be  discovered,  dating  a  century  or  two  earlier  than 
the  Sinaitic  or  Vatican  manuscripts,  is  it  not  more  than 
probable  that  not  a  few  important  corrections  would  be 
made  in  our  present  revised  text  ?  When  we  bear  in 
mind  the  many  remarkable  changes  that  have  been 
made  in  the  Textus  receptus,  on  which  the  King  James's 
English  version  was  based,  necessitating  the  recent  re- 
vised version,  we  need  not  be  surprised  at  the  results  of 
any  new  archaeological  find.  It  is  also  to  be  noted  that 
the  further  back  we  go  in  our  textual  investigations,  the 
more  numerous  the  interpolations  and  changes  may  be 
expected  to  be,  —  an  expectation  amply  sustained  by 
the  history  of  textual  criticism.  So  that  it  may  be 
readily  seen  that  the  genuineness  of  no  portion  of  New 
Testament  literature  can  be  absolutely  relied  on.  It 
has  been  assumed  by  certain  theologians  that  the  most 
accurate  text  now  attainable  should  be  piously  guarded 


PROFESSOR  PFLEIDERER'S  VIEW        379 

as  containing  the  real  words  of  Christ.  But  it  is  im- 
possible to  sustain  such  an  assumption.  Even  if  we 
were  absolutely  certain  that  our  present  gospels  have 
come  down  to  us  in  their  exact  original  form,  which  of 
course  is  far  from  true,  we  should  not  then  be  sure  that 
we  had  Christ's  words  as  they  were  uttered.  Our  gos- 
pels were  not  reduced  to  writing  until  more  than  a  gen- 
eration after  Christ's  death,  even  according  to  the  most 
conservative  estimate,  and  historical  evidence  wholly 
fails  to  justify  this  conclusion,  and  postpones  the  date 
at  least  a  generation  later.  The  first  generation  of 
Christ's  disciples  were  dependent  on  oral  tradition  for 
their  knowledge  of  his  teachings.  Paul,  whose  death 
occurred  more  than  thirty  years  after  that  of  Christ, 
gives  no  hint  that  any  gospel  had  been  written  in  his 
day,  which  probably  explains  the  fact  that  he  makes  so 
little  allusion  to  the  life  and  teachings  of  Christ.  Fur- 
ther, the  Synoptic  gospels  themselves  give  clear  internal 
evidence  of  being  gradually  developed  compendiums 
and  recensions  of  different  oral  traditions  and  written 
gospels,  and  of  being  in  this  way  so  intimately  related 
to  each  other  as  to  indicate  some  common  origin.  The 
later  tradition  that  they  were  written  by  apostles  or 
their  attendants  lacks  historical  proof.  The  tradition 
itself  does  not  appear  until  near  the  middle  of  the  sec- 
ond century,  and  not  in  its  fully  developed  form  till 
near  the  end  of  that  century.  Irenaeus,  who  wrote 
about  180,  that  is  150  years  after  the  death  of  Christ, 
is  the  first  Christian  Father  to  name  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke,  and  John  as  the  authors  of  our  four  gospels. 
How  such  a  tradition  arose  is  an  obscure  question.  But 
it  evidently  grew  out  of  the  tendency  to  seek  apostolic 
authority  for  certain  written  gospels,  and  it  is  not  un- 
likely that  there  was  some  foundation  of  fact  behind  it, 
though  the  present  form  of  the  tradition  is  without  his- 


380  APPENDIX 

torical  proof.  When  we  leave  tradition  and  seek  for 
historical  light  from  the  post-apostolic  writings  them- 
selves concerning  the  date  of  our  four  gospels,  no  clear 
trace  can  be  found  earlier  than  the  middle  of  the  second 
century,  though  detached  passages  are  given  which  bear 
a  likeness  to  corresponding  passages  in  our  gospels; 
but  such  passages  are  not  quoted  from  any  of  our  gos- 
pels, and  it  is  probable  that  they  represent  oral  tradition 
rather  than  any  written  gospel.  A  remarkable  proof  of 
this  is  found  in  a  statement  of  Papias,  who  wrote  about 
A.  D.  140-150,  his  death  occurring  about  A.  d.  155  or 
later.  In  the  fragments  of  a  work  on  the  "  Sayings  of 
Christ,"  Papias  tells  us  how  he  attained  his  knowledge 
of  the  gospel,  declaring  that  he  was  careful  to  question 
every  one  who  had  learned  anything  from  those  who 
had  been  themselves  hearers  of  Christ's  own  disciples, 
that  he  might  thus  learn  from  their  very  lijDs  "what 
Andrew  or  Peter  said,  or  what  was  said  by  Philip,  or 
by  Thomas,  or  by  James,  or  by  John,  or  by  Matthew, 
or  by  any  other  of  the  Lord's  disciples."  "  For  I  im- 
agined that  what  was  to  he  got  from  hooks  was  not  so 
profitable  to  me  as  what  came  from  the  living  and 
abiding  voice.^^  How  clearly  this  fragment  shows  that 
more  than  a  hundred  years  after  Christ's  death,  oral 
tradition  was  still  holding  its  ground  against  certain 
written  gospels  that  were  beginning  to  be  circulated, 
such  as  are  referred  to  in  the  proem  of  Luke's  Gospel. 
There  is  no  evidence  that  Papias  had  any  of  our  present 
gospels  in  his  hands.  Much  has  been  made  of  a  frag- 
ment from  him  in  which  an  account  is  given  of  Mat- 
thew's writing  the  sayings  of  Christ  in  the  Hebrew  lan- 
guage, but  this  cannot  be  our  Greek  Gospel  of  Matthew, 
as  all  admit,  and  Papias  does  not  quote  from  it.  Then 
his  account  of  a  gospel  written  by  Mark  cannot  be 
made  to  square  with  the  character  of  our  present  Mark. 


PROFESSOR  PFLEIDERER'S  VIEW        381 

These  allusions  to  gospels  by  Matthew  and  Mark  are 
the  first  references  to  any  names  of  gospel  writers  that 
appear  in  the.  post-apostolic  Fathers.  The  gospels  thus 
referred  to  by  Papias  probably  belong  to  the  list  of 
earlier  gospels  which  were  being  written  and  used  in 
his  day,  and  later  gave  way  to  our  present  gospels. 
Clear  evidence  of  such  lost  gospels  appears  in  the  early 
Christian  literature.  But  Papias  does  not  seem  to  have 
used  them,  being  prejudiced  against  them  in  favor  of 
oral  tradition.  With  these  facts  in  mind,  how  can  it 
be  claimed  that  the  teachings  of  Christ,  that  have  come 
down  through  such  a  long  period  of  oral  tradition  and 
slowly  developed  reduction  to  writing,  are  the  exact 
words  that  fell  from  his  lips  ?  It  is  also  to  be  remem- 
bered that  Christ  spoke  Aramaic  and  not  Greek,  so 
that  our  earliest  and  most  authentic  Greek  manuscripts 
are  only  a  translation,  and  cannot  therefore  always 
precisely  represent  the  original,  —  the  Semitic  Hebrew 
and  the  Aryan  Greek  differing  so  radically  in  roots, 
structure,  and  idiom.  Surely,  under  such  circumstances, 
critical  scholars,  like  Pfleiderer,  may  be  permitted  to 
doubt  whether  Christ  actually  uttered  certain  words  or 
phrases,  where  internal  exegetical  evidence  is  against  it, 
and  where  such  statements  are  out  of  harmony  with  his 
general  teachings. 


INDEX 


i^BBOT,  Ezra,  essay  on  "Authorship 
of  Fourth  Gospel,"  354  ;  seeks  to 
carry  back  the  date  to  125  A.  d., 
355;  argument  rests  on  "uniform 
tradition,"  355  ;  examination  of 
claims  as  to  acquaintance  of  Justin 
Martyr,  Basilides,  and  Valentinus 
with  fourth  Gospel,  356-359;  not 
fully  mastered  by  the  critical  and 
historical  spirit,  356. 

Abbott,  Lyman,  125,  126,  144,  150, 
168,  206,  284,  286. 

Acton,  Lord,  195. 

Acts,  the  Book  of,  7. 

Alford,  Dean,  331. 

Allen,  A.  V.  G.,  1;  theory  of  Athana- 
sian  immanence  and  Augustinian 
transcendence,  368 ;  criticism  of, 
369-377;  view  of  New  Platonism, 
372 ;  charges  Augustine  with  Man- 
icheanism,  373 ;  view  of  Augus- 
tine's doctrine  of  grace,  373. 

Allen,  J.  H.,2. 

*'  American  Journal  of  Theology,"  9, 
361. 

Anselm's  "  Cur  Deus  Homo,"  84,  94, 
95 ;  foundation  of  mediseval  doc- 
trine of  atonement,  297. 

"  Apocalypse,  The,"  330. 

Apollonius,  324. 

Apostle's  creed,  24,  32. 

Aramaic,  original  language  of  Gospel, 
19. 

Arius,  36,  372. 

Athanasius,  24,  36  ;  trinitarianism  of, 
38-45  ;  not  a  tritheist,  47;  not  Stoic 
but  Platonist,  371 ;  quotation  against 
the  Stoics,  371,  372. 

Athenagoras,  23. 

Atonement,  three  stages  of  doctrine 
in  New  Testament,  288 ;  as  a  sub- 
stitutional sacrifice,  of  Ethnic  and 
Jewish     origin,   292;    doctrine   of 


Epistle  to  Hebrews,  296,  297;  doc- 
trine of  Irenaeus,  Anselm,  Thomas 
Aquinas,  Calvin,  297;  governmental 
and  moral  theories,  298 ;  debasing 
effect  of  material  sacrifices,  302  ; 
Christian,  is  spiritual  at-one-ment, 
307. 
Augustine,  3,  58 ;  culture  of,  64 ; 
philosophical  views,  67-70  ;  trinita- 
rianism, 65,  70,  77;  contrasted  with 
Athanasius,  71,  77,  79,  81;  results 
of  Sabellianizing  tendency,  83-93; 
credulity  of,  324,  325,  330;  what 
saved  him  from  pantheism,  372 ;  not 
a  Manichean  dualist,  373  ;  monistic 
definition  of  sin,  373. 

Baetol,  C.  a.,  1,  2. 
Basil,  55. 

Beard,  Charles,  203. 
Beecher,  H.  W.,  144. 
Berry,  G.  A.,  145. 
Bethlehem,  8. 

Bible,  as  a  medium  of  divine  revela- 
tion, 269. 
Bradford,  A.  H.,  126,  127. 
Brooks,  Phillips,  127,  130,  131,  283. 
Bimyan's  "  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  234. 
Burnet,  Bishop,  99. 
Bushnell,  Horace,  111,  112. 

Calvin,  John,  80,  95  ;  want  of  appre- 
ciation of  nature,  264. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  56. 

Channing,  W.  E.,  107. 

Choate,  J.  H.,219. 

Christology,  19;  Chalcedon  definition 
of,  279  ;  contradiction  involved, 
280  ;  why  it  has  been  a  doctrine 
of  theology  rather  than  of  anthro- 
pology, 280  ;  effect  of  inductive 
method,  281. 

Christopher,  St.,  legend  of,  326. 


384 


INDEX 


Church,  the,  in  what  seiue  a  medium 
of  revelation,  270. 

Cicero,  89,  178. 

Clarke,  Samuel,  99. 

Clementine  Homilies,  a  legendary  ro- 
mance, 327. 

*'  Congregationalist,"  the,  181. 

Cook,  Joseph,  1,  118-125. 

Creeds,  historical,  311. 

Critical  spirit,  distinctive  mission  of, 
224,225. 

Criticism,  historical,  186,  187;  of  the 
Bible,  187-189  ;  final  aim  of,  174 ; 
providential  work  of,  207. 

Dantb,  253. 

Deductive  method  compared  with  in- 
ductive, 237. 

Diderot,  195. 

Dionysius  of  Rome,  23. 

Dogma,  not  of  the  essence  of  religious 
faith,  204,  205  ;  its  function  in  reli- 
gious experience,  205. 

Domer,  I.  A.,  114,  116. 

Edwards,  Jonathan,  103,  235. 
Emerson,  R.  W.,  130,  153,  157. 
Emmons,  Nathaniel,  104,  148  ;  trini- 

tarianism  of,  105-106. 
Erasmus,  179. 
Erdmann,  "  History  of  Philosophy," 

377. 
Eusebius,  correction  of  Irenaeus,  338. 
Evolution,  historical  laws  of,  175. 

Faiebairn,  a.  M.,  136 ;  address  in 
Boston,  302  ;  defence  of  sacrificial 
view  of  atonement,  303,  305. 

Faith,  a  free  movement  of  moral  con- 
sciousness, 201  ;  independent  of 
dogma,  201 ;  evil  effects  of  con- 
founding it  with  dogma,  201,  203  ; 
word  used  in  two  different  senses, 
207,  311;  confining  it  to  its  evan- 
gelical meaning  a  boon  to  theology, 
217,  218  ;  sign.,  of  speedy  revival  of, 
248. 

Fichte,  136. 

Filioque,  57,  97. 

Firmin's  Tracts,  98. 

Fisher,  G.  P.,  109,  note  ;  argument  for 
Johannine  authorship  of  fourth  Gos- 
pel, 331. 

Fiske,  John,  375. 


Fourth  Gospel,  6,  25, 26,  32, 33;  latest 
battle-ground  of  the  critics,  191 ; 
contrast  with  Synoptics,  342;  sub- 
stitutes Logos  for  Messiah,  342 ; 
comparison  of  its  Logos  doctrine 
with  that  of  Justin  Martyr,  343; 
doctrine  of  the  essence  of  the  Chris- 
tian life  compared  with  that  of 
Synoptics,  343;  evidence  of  Philonic 
and  Gnostic  influence,  346  ;  mysti- 
cism of,  846  ;  historical  difficulties, 
348  ;  question  of  historicity,  350 ; 
writer's  object,  350,  352 ;  religious 
idealism  of,  352,  353 ;  first  histor- 
ical  appearance  in  latter  part  of 
second  century,  353 ;  date  not 
proved  to  be  earlier  than  middle  of 
second  century,  359  ;  Theophilus  the 
first  to  name  John  as  author,  365 
(see  Johannine  problem) ;  how  Gos- 
pel came  to  be  attributed  to  John, 
365;  Hamack's  view,  366. 


Gibbon,  Edward,  187. 

Gloag,   "Introduction   to   Johannine 
Writings,"  26,  note. 

Gnosticism,  33,  346. 

God,  old  definitions  of,  271 ;  InductiTe       ( 
view  of,  272.  \ 

Gordon,  G.  A.,  131-134.  ] 

Gore,  C,  90.  \ 

Gospels,  the  four,  first  alluded  to  by 
name  by  Irenseus,  365  ;  question  of        ' 
authorship,    379 ;  not  in    the    lan- 
guage of  Christ's   original   teach-       I 
ings,  381.  * 

Gregory,  Nazianzen,  78. 

Gregory  of  Nyssa,  54.  ; 

Haeckel,  Ernst,  154, 155.  i 

Hamack,  Adolf,  56,  89,  366.  ! 

Harris,  George,  236. 

Harris,  Samuel,  236-246  ;  definition  of 
God,  238  ;  doctrine  of  Christ,  245  ;        ! 
of  Trinity,  245,  246.  \ 

Hartranft,  C.  D.,  indictment  of  sci-       | 
ence,  258-260. 

Heard,  J.  B.,  '' Hulsean   Lectures" 
(1892),  375.  ; 

Hebrews,  epistle  to,  18  ;  view  of  atone- 
ment, 296. 

Hedge,  F.  H.,  2,  130.  I 

Hegelianism,  136.  \ 

HeU,  the  old  dogma  of,  253,  255 ;       i 


INDEX 


385 


in  pictures  of  medisBTal  ohurches, 
303. 

Hilary,  61,  62. 

History,  peculiar  position  of,  as  a 
science,  218 ;  a  medium  of  revela- 
tion, 265,  314  ;  theistic,  309  ;  essen- 
tial optimism  and  idealism  of,  315, 
316. 

loNATiAN  Epistles,  12,  note. 

Induction,  the  law  of,  228. 

Interpolation,  in  New  Testament,  378. 

Irenaeus,  view  of  atonement,  297;  im- 
perfect character  of  text  of  work 
"  Against  Heresies,"  332  ;  lack  of 
critical  spirit  illustrated,  234  ;  rem- 
iniscences of  Polycarp,  337  ;  con- 
founded two  generations  of  disci- 
ples, 339 ;  conclusion  concerning 
historical  credibility  of,  341 ;  first 
to  describe  the  four  Gospels  as 
written  by  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke, 
and  John,  365. 

Jkeomk,  120;  credulity  of,  329. 

Jesus  Christ,  birthplace,  8  ;  tradition 
of  miraculous  birth,  11,  12  ;  histor- 
ical foundation  of  the  new  Chris- 
tianity, 198,  201 ;  not  a  dogmatist, 
202 ;  characteristics  of  moral  con- 
sciousness, 265-269 ;  protest  against 
Jewish  sacrificial  atonement,  289; 
his  own  teaching  of  moral  at-one- 
ment,  291 ;  spoke  Aramaic,  not 
Greek,  381. 

Johannine  problem,  6,  25,  319. 

John,  the  apostle,  19 ;  historically 
accredited  facts  concerning,  319- 
322  ;  plays  a  small  part  in  New 
Testament  narratives,  320;  defects 
of  disposition  and  character,  321; 
disappears  early  in  the  Acts,  321 ; 
not  mentioned  by  Paul  in  later 
epistles,  321  ;  testimony  of  Papias 
concerning  manner  of  death,  322; 
in  Post- Apostolic  age  becomes  centre 
of  legendary  growth,  322  ;  no  his- 
torical basis  for  tradition  of  great 
age,  330  ;  not  identified  with  seer  of 
Patmos,  330  ;  not  author  of  fourth 
Gospel,  356,  365. 

John  of  Damascus,  78,  80. 

John  the  Elder,  338,  365,  366. 

John,  Gospel  of,  see  *'  fourth  Gospel." 


Justin  Martyr,  10;  argument  for 
Christ's  miraculous  birth,  13  ;  logos 
doctrine  derived  from  Greek  phi- 
losophy, 29  ;  character  of  doctrine, 
29-32;  account  of  Simon  Magus, 
327,  328 ;  no  clear  historical  proof 
of  acquaintance  with  fourth  Gospel, 
354-358. 

KaToAAayTj     (reconciliation),    use   in 

New  Testament,  288. 
Eenosis,  281. 
Kepler,  232. 

Legends  concerning  the  Apostles,  322 ; 

causes  of  growth,   322,  323;  unhio- 

torical  character,  324,  325. 
Lessing,  140. 
Logos,  18  ;  doctrine  of,  25 ;  origin  of 

doctrine,  27;  character  of,  29. 
Lucretius,  "  DeNatura  Deorum,"  233* 
Luke,  Gdspel  of,  8, 10. 
Luther,  ix. 

Man,  consubstantiality  with  God,  as  ft 
scientific  doctrine,  286. 

Marcellus,  44. 

Mark,  Gospel  of,  11,  380. 

Mary,  mother  of  Jesus,  10,  13;  im- 
maculate conception  of,  13. 

Materialism,  one  phase  of  monistic 
pantheism,  309 ;  protest  of  moral 
consciousness  against,  309. 

Matthew,  Gospel  of,  8  ;  genealogy  of 
first  chapter,  8,  10 ;  testimony  of 
Papias  concerning  a  Hebrew  gospel 
of,  380. 

Media,  the,  of  divine  revelation,  264- 
270. 

Me<riT>j9,  18. 

Messiah,  5,  8  ;  in  Old  Testament,  7, 15. 

Methodology,  250. 

Milton,  John,  254. 

Monism,  129 ;  philosophical,  distin- 
guished from  scientific,  154;  ideal- 
istic, distinguished  from  materialis- 
tic, 155-159  ;  versus  dualism,  159  ; 
essentially  unitarian,  166. 

Moore,  Aubrey,  376. 

Mysticism,  274. 

Natttre,  a  medium  of  revelation,  264. 
Neander,  A.,  ix.  12,  note,  249,  370. 
Newman,  J.  H.,  149. 


386 


INDEX 


New  Platonism,  65. 
"New  World,"  v. 
Nicene  creed,  23,  58, 167. 
Niebuhr,  187. 

'0/Ltocos  (like),  38,  63. 

'Ofioiovo-ios  (like  in  essence),  37,  63. 

'O/iioovo-ios  (completely  like  in  es- 
sence), 37,  63  ;  meaning  theologi- 
cally, 45-51. 

Origen,  24,  34;  doctrine  of  eternal 
generation  of  the  Son,  34,  35. 

Orthodoxy,  presuppositions  of,  249, 
250. 

Ovo-ia  (essence),  52-54. 

Pantaktts,  368. 

Pantheism,  87  ;  result  of  philosophi- 
cal monism,  308. 

Papias,  distinguishes  two  Johns,  and 
three  generations  of  early  disciples, 
337 ;  preference  of  oral  tradition 
to  written  gospels,  380 :  no  evidence 
of  use  of  present  gospels,  381. 

Patmos,  330. 

Paul,  5,  17;  doctrine  of  God  and  of 
Christ,  21  ;  new  element  introduced 
into  doctrine  of  atonement,  293; 
mixture  of  Jewish  and  Greek  ideas, 
295. 

Peter,  19;  historical  knowledge  of, 
ends  with  New  Testament,  326  ;  the 
legend  of,  326-329  ;  no  historical 
proof  that  he  ever  visited  Rome, 
328  ;  story  of  visit  rests  on  fiction  of 
Simon  Magus,  328 ;  supposed  tomb 
under  St.  Peter's  church,  328  ;  tra- 
dition of  martyrdom  a  pure  legend, 
329. 

Pfleiderer,  Otto,  article  in  "  New 
World,"  377-381 ;  view  of  Christ's 
doctrine  of  atonement,  378. 

Plato,  quotation  from  "  Republic," 
301. 

Platonism,  contrasted  with  Stoicism 
and  New  Platonism,  66. 

Plotinus,  87 ;  "  Enneads  "  of,  88 ;  pan- 
theism of,  90,  91 ;  present  influence 
on  New  England  thought,  138. 

Plumptre,  J.  H.,  article  on  John  in 
Smith's  "Bible  Dictionary,"  324. 

Polycarp,  20, 336 ;  no  allusion  in  "  epis- 
tle "  to  John  or  fourth  Gospel,  338  ; 
no  allusion  to  Holy  Spirit  or  Com- 


forter, or  Logos,  339 ;  "  Martyrdom 
of,"  filled  with  miraculous  and  le- 
gendary elements,  339. 
Protestant  Reformation,  177-179. 

"  Quicungue  Vult  "  (Pseudo-Athana* 
nasian  creed),  98. 

Raphael,  227. 

Reason,  the,  double  meaning  of  the 

term,  and  consequent  confusion  in 

theology,  221-223. 

Sabatikh,  Auguste,  210  ;  view  of  dif- 
ference between  faith  and  dogma, 
210 ;  view  of  dogma  as  essential  to 
religious  life,  211  ;  criticism  of  view, 
212-216. 

Sabellianism,  75. 

Salmasius,  246. 

Schaff ,  Philip,  89  note,  329  note. 

Schleiermacher,  110. 

Schwegler,  Albert,  "Handbook  of 
History  of  PhOosophy,"  136,  377. 

Science,  not  in  conflict  with  religion, 
230. 

Semo  Sancus,  a  Sabine  divinity,  327  ; 
confounded  by  Justin  with  Simon 
Magus,  328 ;  discovery  of  pedestal 
with  inscription  to  Semo  Sancus, 
229. 

Septuagint  version,  12. 

Shedd,  W.  G.  T.,  114;  description  of 
hell,  255. 

Sherlock,  99. 

Simon  Magus,  328. 

Sinaitic  Syriac  manuscript,  9,  note. 

Smith,  H.B.,  114,  115,  117. 

Stephen,  Leslie,  testimony  to  falla- 
cious character  of  memory,  339. 

Strong,  A.  H.,  136,  note. 

Stuart,  Moses,  107-113. 

Tatian's  "  Diatessaron,"  9. 

TertuUian,  10,  note,  61,  62 ;  account  of 
John's  miraculous  escape  from 
death,  324. 

Theism,  an  intuition  of  moral  con- 
sciousness, 308. 

Theology,  a  science,  217, 257  ;  should 
be  allowed  full  scientific  freedom, 
218 ;  the  old,  materialistic,  310 ; 
the  new,  theistic,  308;  the  new, 
spiritualistic,  309;  the  new,  distin- 


INDEX 


387 


guishes  faith  as  a  religiouB  act  from 
belief  as  au  intellectual  act,  311  ; 
the  noblest  department  of  philoso- 
phy, 312  ;  its  golden  age  in  the  fu- 
ture, 313. 

Tradition,  unanimity  of,  not  a  suffi- 
cient ground  of  historicity,  322 ;  oral, 
held  ground  for  a  hundred  years  af- 
ter Christ's  death,  380. 

Trinitarian,versus  Unitarian,  no  longer 
a  live  issue,  277,  278. 

Trinitarianism,  the  Nicene,  four  stages 
of  evolution,  24  ;  three  divisions  of 
history  of,  97 ;  the  "  new,"  165, 
169  ;  versus  the  new  Unitarianism, 
169-171  ;  two  opposite  forms  of, 
276 ;  traditional  dogmatic,  how 
viewed  by  the  new  inductive  theol- 
ogy, 277. 


Trinity,  the,  in  the  Ethnic  religions, 
275 ;  the  Christian,  historical,  and 
philosophical  origin,  275. 

'YTToo-Tao-i?  (concrete  being),  distin- 
guished from  ovaCa,  54. 

VlCTOEDOJS,  M.,  89. 

Wateeland,  100-102. 
Watts,  Isaac,  102. 
Whiton,  J.  M.,  134,  135. 
Whittier,  hymn  quoted,  283. 
Wilson,  "  Hulsean  Lectures  "  (1899), 

376. 
Wordsworth,  quoted,  264. 

Zelleb,  E.,  87. 


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